


Love what now?!

by Erin1324



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Pining Keith (Voltron), Pining Lance (Voltron), Possessive Behavior, Possessive Keith, love bug, love bug au, protective keith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-04
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-07-06 23:07:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 24,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15896004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erin1324/pseuds/Erin1324
Summary: Lance and Keith go on a mission together, neither are very happy about it, but they go. They need to find this flower that is going to help fix the castle ship, none of the humans really get how that works. Before they can even get said flower, a mysterious bug bites Keith and now he loves Lance. Wait he loves Lance?! How did that happen? This doesn't help Lance in anyway whose had a crush on Keith since the Galaxy Garrison, but has hidden it.





	1. A bug?

Nalara was a beautiful planet, it almost (almost being a key word here) reminded Lance of Earth. Of course it was nothing like Earth, at all, but it gave off a type of feeling. Keith and Lance had been sent to the surface of Nalara, in search of a certain flower, apparently this flowers pollen was going to help the castle ship in some way. Lance didn't quite understand how a flower would be of use, but there were a lot of the unknown to the humans, as the paladins had been discovering. While he didn't want to be here with Keith of all people, he just couldn't help feeling homesick, he hated feeling homesick, it always left a pain in his chest, that was almost an ache. 

It didn't help that Lance was almost positive that it was about to rain on this planet, Lance loved the rain, he always wished that just on one planet while they were there it would rain. He hadn't seen rain in awhile, and he missed it along with a lot of other things from Earth, mainly his family. Lance hated it. Hated he had to be feeling this right now, on this mission, with Keith. Of course Lance didn't hate Keith, but Keith sure hated him from what Lance could tell. 

Nalara was beautiful, up ahead of them were flowers, not the ones they needed however, but wow were they beautiful. Blue leaves and stems, with yellow flowers, looking a lot like Earth's sun flowers. Lance remembered them because they were his sisters favourite, she thought roses were cliche, which Lance's Mother would strongly disagree with. There were some trees scattered here and there, blue trunks and pink leaves that somehow complimented the other perfectly, it was a little strange but over all, a sight worth seeing. Lance sighed content, closing his eyes and enjoying the warm sun on his skin, Lance already loved this planet. 

Allura had said that it was never inhabited, unless you count animal life forms, plants and bugs. It was nice not having anyone really around, peaceful even. Up head of Lance, (quite a bit up ahead) Keith was glaring at him, his helmet tucked under his arm, violet eyes staring at him. Lance smiled sheepishly, and Keith rolled his eyes, Lance jogged over catching up to him. He took his helmet off, it was getting too hot. He ran a hand through his sweaty hair and sighed pleased at the cool breeze that ruffled his bangs. They began walking, following the coordinates Coran sent them with, when Lance felt a small drop of something wet on his head. No way, it couldn't be.

"Hey Keith, did you feel that?" Lance mumbled. Keith turned to look at him, Lance's head trained on the dark clouds above, Keith tilted his head up following Lance's gaze and sighed.

"We'll just have to wait it out." Keith replied, grumpily. Lance was smiling at the sky a fond expression on his face, one Keith had never seen before, not ever being directed at his best friend, or any other teammates. His eyes were shinning and he smiled lazily at the sky, his face completely relaxed, his shoulders back and hair rustling in the wind. Lance laughed, something that sounded so adorable, like little bells were ringing in Keith's ears. He shook his head clearing his thoughts.

"Wait it out, Keith are you kidding? I've been waiting for it to rain on a planet for like ever." Lance laughed again, and Keith felt heat pooling in his chest looking at Lance fondly, before snapping out of it. He walked under one of the pink and blue trees just as it started to pour, Keith watched as Lance stood in the middle of the clearing, eyes closed, smiling. He laughed again and began to stomp around in the puddles, making Keith smile, he was such a kid.

Lance hollered, into the sky. He continued running around splashing in the puddles, coming to a stop and tilting his head back with another laugh, Lance had almost forgotten the feel of rain water running down his face, the smell of it and the feelings of joy he felt standing in the rain, he used to play with his nieces and nephews, in the rain while visiting Veronica. Man he missed them a lot, Lance sighed sadly. He was pulled out of his trance when he heard a loud curse, followed by a yelp and a smacking sound that made him flinch. He tuned his head and spotted Keith under a tree, rubbing a spot on his neck, a look of discomfort on his face. Lance jogged over and sent him a worried look, which was missed because Keith was looking at the ground.

 

"Keith?" Lance asked unsure. "You alright?" 

Keith looked up and, his thought process stopped immediately, ocean blue eyes stared into his violet ones, and Keith gave Lance a soft smile, his expression turning fond. Lance had never seen such a look on Keith, let alone directed at him, his heart beat increased, anxiety wrapping around his throat tightly.

"Lance." Keith breathed, Lance furrowed his brows, something was definitely wrong.  

"Did a bug bite you?" Lance questioned, eyes roaming his face quickly. Keith shook his head, but Lance wasn't convinced. "Turn around please." He stated calmly, Keith gave him a funny look but didn't argue, which hello big give away right there. Lance moved Keith's hair aside to see a bight pink mark on the back of his neck, Lance sighed lightly, this should be fun. 

Lance grabbed his helmet placing it one his head, turning the comms on, hearing a slight crackle before it picked the signal up. "We have a slight problem guys." Lance said into the helmet mic. There was static before Hunk's worried voice cut through. 

 

"What's wrong? Are you guys okay?" 

"I think so, but Keith was bit, by a bug just a few second ago and I'm not sure if there is any alien toxins to be aware of, that could harm humans." Lance rambled.

"Did you get a look at the bug?" Shiro asked calmly, although there was an edge to his voice. 

"Nope, I wasn't near Keith. Heard him curse and then smack his neck and came over to see why he cursing so much. Found the bite mark on the back of his-" Lance cut off abruptly, as arms snaked their way across Lance's torso, Lance turned his head to see Keith hugging him from behind, a smile stretching across his face, he leaned closer, putting his face in the crook of Lance's neck. Keith's breath tickled Lance's neck causing a shiver to dance down his spine. "Neck." Lance finished, awkwardly.

"You smell nice." Keith mutters into Lance's skin and he stills, spine stiffening and coughing, trying not to choke on his spite. Because dios, Keith freaking Kogane is hugging him, of seemingly free will.

"Dios," Lance mutters under his breath. "Yeah something is very wrong." Lance says. 

"We're heading back to the Red lion, hopefully Keith can actually fly it." Lance mutters the last part, earning a pout from Keith who is close enough to hear him, Lance sighs. This will be a long day.


	2. Violent?

Lance sighs as he drags Keith with him, he wouldn't let go of him for even a second, he was pretty much getting part of a piggy back ride. Lance turns to Keith and frowns at him.

"Can you please walk beside me." Lance whines, Keith's weight and his own with the sun beating down on them was making it hard to walk, Lance is overheating. Keith pouts at him but moved to his side and grabs his hand in his own, holding on tightly. Lance sighs in relief. Lance couldn't handle Keith's affection, he already had a crush on him and had been covering it up, with the whole rivalry thing. Why did this have to happen to him? What had he done to deserve this?

They continued through the dried dirt, to the Red lion. Red's eyes light up as soon as they round the corner of trees, Keith smiled at Red and looked like he was back to normal. He released Lance's hand and ran up to Red, Lance felt relived, that means maybe it wasn't such a bad affect. After he went up to Red he turned back to Lance and smiled that same fond expression still on his face, Lance sighed. Guess he's not back to normal, Lance ran up to the Red lion and his paladin, with a small smile. 

"Alright, get us out of here," Lance said smiling lightly. "When we do get back to the castle, please let Coran and Pidge check on you, just to make sure the bug wasn't dangerous. Without argument." Lance sighs, walking with Keith to the cockpit of the lion. Keith turns his head to him and gives a small smile as he sits in Red's seat.

"As long as you stay with me, I'll do whatever you want." Keith responds with a smirk and winks at him. Lance feels heat rise to his face and turns his head away, clearing his throat. Keith smiles Lance is so adorable. 

The Red lion pulls into his hanger and opened his mouth, Keith grabbed Lance's hand and pulled him out of Red by his hand. Lance didn't know where Keith was taking him, but let himself be dragged hoping he'd be going by the med bay. Pidge and Shiro walked down the halls toward them, Shiro glanced down at their hands in each others and frowns, it wasn't like Keith to hold hands. Pidge giggled when she seen their hands, winking at Lance, which causes his face to heat up, turning a pinkish colour, which Keith thought was cute. Shiro came up to Keith and starting talking to him, Lance slipped his hand out of Keith's and walked over to Pidge. 

"Hey, I think, I should go back to Nalara and get the flower we need," Lance said, eyeing Pidge. "Can you make sure Keith gets to the med bay so you can check out the bite?" Lance continued. Pidge raised a brow, but nodded. 

"Do you want to take Hunk with you?" She asked, glancing at Keith and Shiro over Lance's shoulder, Keith kept glancing over at them he didn't seem very interested in whatever Shiro was saying.

"Uh sure, but we have to make sure not to take our helmets off, don't want to be bit by the same bug as Keith." Lance chuckled nervously, Pidge grinned at him.

"Okay, I'll go grab Hunk." Pidge declared, winking at him and running off.

"Keith!" Shiro called, Lance turned around to be knocked on his butt, as Keith ran to hug him. He gasps in surprise. Keith wraps his arms around Lance's neck, and his legs around his hips, like a toddler, burying his face in Lance's neck, sighing happily.

"Keith, Buddy whatcha doing?" Lance asks breathing shakily, he spots Shiro over Keith's shoulder and mouths help me. Keith doesn't respond just hugs him tighter.

"Keith, come on give Lance some space." Shiro says using his 'Dad voice' Keith doesn't respond only hugs Lance even tighter. Lance sighs, motioning for Shiro to grab Keith.

"Keith I need to go back to the planet we were just on, you need to let go." Keith makes a sound like a whine in the back of his throat, frowning and not moving. Lance nods at Shiro, who comes up behind Keith, prying him off of Lance. Keith whines and complains, but Shiro holds him tight as he kicks and tries to get back to Lance. Lance sighs knowing he'll regret this, he stands up and looks Keith in the eye.

"When I get back you can hug me all you want." Lance smiles awkwardly. Keith breaks into a small smile, and stops moving in Shiro's arms, Shiro looks at Lance in surprise and Lance just shrugs.

"Hey, is Keith alright?" Hunk's voice comes from down the hallway, Lance looks up and smiles at his best friend, he needs a Hunk hug right now. Lance walks up to him wrapping his arms around Hunk and sighs, Hunk wraps his arms around Lance giving him a bear hug. "You alright, Bud?" Hunk asks quietly. 

"Yeah, just needed one of your hugs." Lance says smiling into Hunk's chest. Keith watches as Lance hugs Hunk and feels a strong rage of jealousy coarse through him, he squirms in Shiro's arms, but Shiro tightens his hold. Hunk picks Lance up and spins him around and Lance laughs joyfully, Keith feels his eyes burn, he should be the one making him laugh not Hunk.

Keith feels a tear fall, and he growls, startling Shiro into loosening his hold. It's enough for Keith to slip through his arms, quickly walking over to Lance, Shiro's eyes widen.

"Lance!" He calls, Lance turns his head quickly seeing Keith approach and he looks pissed, Lance hides behind Hunk and Hunk seems to understand who he's hiding from because he blocks Lance and doesn't move. Keith growls and tries to move around Hunk, but when he gets around him Lance isn't there, he growls again getting angry, he will hurt anyone who keeps him away from Lance. 

"Where is he Hunk?" Keith growls, his voice sounds inhuman and Hunk shrinks back, but shrugs. "You're hiding him aren't you?" Keith grinds his teeth. He pulls his bayard out of his armour and raises it at Hunk, Hunk gaps at him. Behind him Shiro is yelling at Keith, but he ignores him and moves forward. He almost strikes Hunk with his sword, when Lance jumps in front of him.

"I'm right here Keith, please don't hurt Hunk. I hid myself." Lance says quickly, Keith has stopped his sword in mid air, trying not to hurt his love. He smiles warmly at him and deactivates his bayard, Lance sighs in relief. He stares at Keith and Keith stares back, Keith looks over his shoulder and glares at Hunk. He turns back to Lance and steps forward wrapping his arms around Lance, in a hug. Lance stills, doesn't move an inch and Keith grins, happy that he doesn't try to get away.

"Mine." Keith growls into Lance's neck, loud enough for the others to hear, they all take a step back, away from Keith and Lance, including Shiro.

"Uh Pidge I think Shiro and Hunk should go get the flower." Lance says quietly. Pidge nods frantically, shooting said people a look to get going, Keith keeps an eye on both of them, glaring. Lance wraps his arms around Keith's back and Keith snuggles closer. Lance glances at Pidge mouthing med bay she nods in understanding and heads toward the end of the hall. Hopefully she'll grab Coran, Lance looks at Keith.

"What was that all about?" Lance mumbles to him, Keith looks up at him and frowns. 

"They were trying to keep us away from each other." Keith says, dully like it makes all the sense in the world.

"Keith, they weren't trying to keep us away from each other it's just, this isn't you and the team doesn't want you to do anything you might regret." Lance says backing away to see Keith. "When they get back you need to apologise okay?" Lance says more softly. Keith looks up at him and smiles, nodding his head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't I feel like this chapter was a little extra but oh well. Hope ya like it!!


	3. Apologizing?!

"Okay lets get you to the med bay, make sure everything's okay.” Lance announces. Keith nods, grabbing Lance's hand and walking through the halls to the med bay. 

Pidge is in there already with Coran, they both seem to be setting something up with the controls. Lance nudges Keith and nods his head toward Pidge giving him a look, Keith whines in the back of his throat, but clears his throat turning to Pidge.

"Hey Pidge, I'm sorry if I scared you earlier, I know it wasn't right of me to try to attack Hunk. I was just jealous because he was hugging Lance and making him laugh, that's my job.” Keith pouts, out of the corner of his eye he catches Lance's eyes widen, before a pleased smile stretches across his face. Keith grins, proud that he made Lance smile. Pidge turns to him slowly, eyeing him carefully.

"It's fine, but if you hurt anyone , including Lance. I won't forgive you.” Pidge glared at Keith, pushing her glasses up. "And I'll kick your ass." She continued, still glaring at him before turning back to her gadgets. 

"I would never hurt Lance!” Keith answers, sounding almost offended. "I love him too much.” Keith said finally. To his left where Lance was standing, he heard an intake of breath and then him clearing his throat.

"So,” Lance drawled out, "What kind of tests are you doing Pidge?" His face was turning a very deep red, and Pidge suppressed a laugh.

"Blood test and a brain scan,” She answered, she turned to Keith. "As long as that's alright with you?" She questioned. Keith watched her carefully before responding.

"Yeah sure, as long as Lance stays in the room.” Keith said, glancing to his left. Lance nodded at him in confirmation. Pidge sighed, in what sounded like exhaustion. 

"Oh quiznack,” Coran said suddenly startling them all. They all turned to him and gave him a confused look. "I think, I might just know what bit Number 2.” He said to them.

"Which would be?" Pidge questioned, blinking at him.

"A love bug.” Coran declared. Lance blinked.

"I'm sorry love what now?!" He declares. Coran smiles at him.

"Well Number 3, it's a small bug. When it bites it's host the person they,” Coran cuts off glancing at Keith quickly before continuing. "The first person they see, they fall in love with. I think King Alfor got bit once, when he was married too, caused quite an issue with their marriage actually, if I remember correctly.” Coran mutters, remembering his time on Altea. 

"Is there a cure?" Pidge offers, just what Lance had been thinking. It made a bit more sense as to why Keith was acting this way, he would never like Lance.

"No, it just wears off. It was too dangerous to make a cure, I believe it was made at one point and they used it, causing the host immense pain until they died.” Coran explains a little too cheerfully. "It's safer to just let it wear off." He concludes, eyeing Keith carefully.

Lance sighs. "How long does it normally last?" He asks curiously. Coran looks at him and gives an apologetic look.

"About one movement" Coran says quietly. Lance stares at him for a dobosh expecting him to say he's kidding, Coran twines his moustache around his finger nervously.

"You're not kidding. This thing lasts a week!" Lance exclaims in a panic. 

"Chill dude, at least it wears off.” Pidge grumbles, moodily.

"Well,” Coran draws out, the three paladins look at him. "It get worse as the movement progresses and for some people it take two movements." Coran continues. Lance and Pidge stare at him, in bewilderment, however a certain red paladin, stares at a certain blue paladin, wanting to hug and give him love, dragging him away from everyone and protect him from everything, he holds back on that staring at Lance longingly.

"What if I just locked myself in my room until the week is over?" Lance asks, Keith's eyes widen and he feels them burn, tears welling in them. Does Lance really hate him that much? Coran frowns disapprovingly.

"Are you crazy? You did see what he tried to do to Hunk when he thought he was hiding you.” Pidge accuses glaring at Lance, Keith is about to interject, but Coran beats him to it.

"I second that, as well as he will get moody, violent and might even start experiencing pain that only you can sooth.” Coran says thoughtfully, Lance winces then sighs. 

"Good point.” He says frowning. Keith feels a tear fall down his face and he quickly wipes it away.

Shiro and Hunk enter the med bay and everyone turns to them, they have some of the flowers that the castle needed, Hunk handed them off to Coran. Lance shoots Keith a look, narrowing his eyes at him, Keith knows what that look is for. He turns to both of them and clears his throat, they turn and stare at him curiously.

"I'd like to apologise to both of you," Keith starts, glancing a Lance, he nods at him. "Shiro I'm sorry for ignoring you when you were talking to me and for scaring you.” Keith continues, he sees Lance grinning at him and for some reason that gives him courage, he turns to Hunk.

"Hunk, I'm very sorry for growling, snapping and trying to attack you. It was uncalled for and I should have just spoken to you, I'm sorry if I scared you. I was just jealous." Keith goes on to explain. Hunk furrows his brows and looks confused about something, while Shiro just gaps at Keith in surprise. He hardly ever apologised to anyone, Hunk eyed him and cleared his throat.

"Right, right and what exactly were you jealous of?" He asks Keith curiously. Keith looks at him like he's lost it, and Lance clears his throat, Keith looks at him and Lance nods toward Hunk and narrows his eyes at Keith. Keith shrinks back with a little whine, that is only heard by himself. 

"You hugging Lance and making him laugh.” Keith mumbles, he's tired of going over it and he's only said it twice now. Hunk stares at him for a long moment, glancing in Lance's direction seeming still very confused. Keith looks back at Lance and sees Lance shoot him a very proud smile, which makes him perk up a little.

"I'm sorry, can someone explain this?" Hunk says eyeing the others suspiciously."I thought Keith hated Lance and vice versa and that's why they always argue.” Hunk declared furrowing his brow. Keith gasps at Hunk and the group of humans (and one Altean) turn to stare at him. 

"No, I love Lance!” Keith exclaims, glaring at Hunk, he rushes over to Lance and wraps him in a hug. "Please don't listen to him, I love you, I love you so much.” Keith mutters into Lance's jacket. Lance furrows his brows.

"But he's right Keith, you don't actually love me. It's the bug, you hate me actually, you think I'm annoying and obnoxious, you can't stand being near me too long, I get on your nerves." Lance says, eyeing Keith. He whines and looks up at Lance with tears in his eyes, Coran inhales sharply overhearing what Lance has said.

"I d-don't h-hate you. I love you Lance!" Keith yells the last part, letting the tears fall freely from his eyes. Lance looks at him in surprise, Keith never cries, if he does it's away from others. 

"Hey don't cry Keith dios, you might think you love me, but you don't.” Lance sighs. Coran is looking at Lance frantically. He rushes over and leans in Lance's ear.

"Lance, you can't reject him. The pain remember?" Coran whispers hurriedly. Lance's eyes widen in realisation. As if on queue Keith yelps a hand coming to his chest and he whimpers in pain, Lance turns to Coran.

"What do I do?!" He asks crouching beside Keith's hunched frame. The others who were all talking turned their attention to Keith, pausing what they were talking about. Pidge was probably telling them what was going on with Keith. 'This is utter hell' Lance thought to himself. Keith hunches over, clawing at his chest.


	4. Pain

As soon as those words had left Lance's mouth Keith felt uneasy, he felt conflicted. Almost like he knew Lance was right but didn't, it was confusing. Pain bubbled in his chest and everything seemed to fade, he sank to the floor clutching his chest and whimpered, Lance was beside him he knew, where everyone else was, he didn't have a clue. Then Lance's voice sliced through some of the pain.

"What do I do?" Was asked there was a muffled reply and then Lance's soft, warm hands were touching his arms. 

"Keith, can you hear me?" He asked, his touch eased the pain but only just. Keith nodded at Lance's question and heard him sigh in relief. There were more muffled voice and then Lance's cut through his hazy focus.

"Keith, I know you love me,” was breathed close to his ear, Keith felt a shiver run down his spine. "I know you do.” Lance repeated. "I was only joking, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." He said worriedly. Keith felt his breath return to him and the pain subside a little bit. Lance pulled Keith to sit in his lap and wrapped his arms around him tightly. Keith sighed and leaned in, putting his face in Lance's neck and breathing slowly. Lance smelled like honey and vanilla, it fit Lance perfectly and reminded Keith of Earth, he felt himself calming down as Lance started to mumble to him in Spanish. 

"Estas bien, Keith. Todo está bien. Yo también te amo." Lance murmured. Keith relaxed just as black spots danced around his vision, and he was fading from reality into darkness.

____

When Keith's wakes up there is a dull pain in his chest, barely noticeable. He opens his eyes lazily, it almost feels like they had been glued shut. He's in a bed he realises and upon further inspection it's his room, Lance is no where in sight. 

Keith feels panic eat at his chest and the pain increases just a little bit. Keith gets out of his bed and walks to his door, only for it to not open, Keith panic increases. What if Lance is in danger? Who will protect him? Who will make sure he doesn't try to throw himself in front of another person and get hurt? It's already happened before and at that moment in time, Keith wouldn't have admitted it, but he had been terrified. Maybe he just hadn't pushed the right button, or the ship was malfunctioning. He tries again, and thankfully it opens, Keith runs out the panic getting worse. 

Lance is the only thing on his mind at the moment, he runs to his room and knocks, on the door opens but he's not in there. He checks the training room next, no ones in there either, next is the bridge, Allura was there but Keith wasn't looking for her, he left quickly. 

He went to the kitchen and sighed, there sitting and talking was Lance, Shiro, Hunk, Pidge and Coran. Keith walked right up to Lance and Hunk paused what he was saying. Keith walked up to Lance and fell into his lap, putting his face in Lance's neck and wrapping his arms around his neck, Lance didn't still like Keith was expecting him to, he just stayed where he was and turned to Hunk.

"What were you saying Hunk?" Lance asks, eyeing him curiously. Hunk looks at Lance like he's nuts, Shiro clears his throat.

"Something about you cooking with your family.” Shiro says, trying to remind Hunk. Hunk smiles and continues his story, Keith doesn't listen, instead he places his head on Lance's chest and listens to his heart beat, he closes his eyes and relaxes. Lance's hand comes up and he starts playing with Keith's hair, just twirling it around his finger and then massaging his scalp. Keith closes his eyes with a relaxed sigh. Lance's chest rumbles in a laugh and Keith turns to him, watching as he laughs about something Pidge said.

"Yeah, okay Pidge." Lance snorts. Pidge glares at him.

"What it's just a theory" She responds, looking offended.

"It would be a wrong theory" Coran pipes in smirking at the Green paladin. Pidge grumbles under her breathe something about stupid boys and what do they know, Lance snorts again smiling at Pidge softly.

____

Lance stretches and decides he needs to get up, Keith fell asleep curled in his lap. Almost like a kitten, Lance sighs and picks him up. The action is enough to wake Keith up, he glances around and then spots Lance and gives him a questioning look.

"Welcome back sleeping beauty." He mumbles and Keith smiles a little. 

"Where are we going?" Keith mumbles in a sleepy voice, Lance grimaces.

"Well, I was going to bring you to your room then I was going to go to mine and sleep." Lance says, Keith stares at him for a moment, then pouts.

"Can't I sleep in your room?" Keith whines, giving Lance puppy dog eyes, Lance shakes his head.

"You wouldn't forgive me afterwards if I let you do that.” Lance sighs, Keith keeps staring at Lance trying to get him to give in. "Oh, look your room. Good night Keith, I'll see you in the morning." Lance attempts to move to his room, after placing Keith down. 

"Lance!" Keith childishly stomps his foot. "Let me sleep with you.” He whines. Lance sighs and turns to face Keith but continues moving backward. 

"No can do.” He says with a cheeky grin, Keith huffs and starts to run after Lance, Lance's eyes widen and he tries to sprint to his room, he's almost there when Keith tackles him to the floor. Lance is sprawled out on his back and Keith is straddling him, he grabs Lance's wrists and pins them to the floor, Keith is glaring at Lance. 

"Keith.” Lance sighs. "It's not a good idea." 

"It is,” Keith whines. "Please Lance." Lance groans. Keith suddenly wants to kiss him, Lance wouldn't mind would he. Keith leans forward and brushes his lips against Lance's. Lance stills and inhales sharply. 

"Keith, stop.” Lance breathes, his body is ridged and Keith frowns at him. 

"You don't like me?" Tears well in his eyes and Lance sighs. 

"It's not that.” Lance declares, eyeing Keith carefully. Keith leans forward again, brushing Lance's lips again. 

"So, you don't want me to kiss you?" Keith asks, lowly. Brushing his lips against Lance's again. 

"No.” Lance sighs. He tries to push up, but Keith keeps him pinned to the floor. Tighten his grip on his wrists. "You're lying.” Keith murmurs, moving to kiss Lance fully. 

Lance's eyes widen and at the last second he turns his head and Keith ends up kissing his cheek. Keith scowls at Lance baring his teeth in an animalistic kind of way. Lance gulps, what had he gotten himself into?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm I the only one obsessed with love bug au for Klance? Honestly there just fun and fluffy.


	5. Kissing?

Lance squirms, trying to lift his hands but Keith keeps them pinned and growls. Lance sighs, and narrows his eyes at Keith in his 'I'm mad and if you don't stop I won't forgive you' way. Keith eyes widen and he lets go almost immediately. 

"I'm sorry.” Keith says shamefully eyes glued to the floor, he gets off of Lance. Lance sighs again in frustration. 

"It's fine just-just don't do that again please.” Lance says quietly. Keith frowns and starts heading to his own room, and Lance is mad at himself for feeling disappointed. 

"See you in the morning Keith." Lance says softly, and Keith turns and smiles softly. 

"Yeah see you then." Keith replies heading into his room. Lance turns and heads to his room, closing the door and falling asleep almost immediately. 

_____

Keith lays in bed for awhile, before falling asleep he's very angry. Not really with Lance, but with himself, he just couldn't help it. He wanted to kiss Lance and Lance seemed to be enjoying it, Keith was confused if he liked Keith kissing him why did he reject him? Did he not like him? Keith's chest gives a pang at the thought, and he sneaks out of his room, heading to Lance's. 

It's around 3 A.M. (or what would be 3 A.M. back on Earth.) Keith can hear Lance's soft breathing through the door and doesn't want to wake him up, but also doesn't want to just sneak in. He enters and watches Lance move with a furrow in his brows.

"Lance,” Keith whispers shaking him, "I need to stay in here, the pain came back." Keith says softly, he knows Lance is a soft sleeper. 

"Keith,” Lance mumbles sleepily. "What are you doin’?” Lance slurs. 

"The pain is back.” He says softly and Lance furrows his brows, moves over and lifts the blanket but says nothing. Keith crawls in and as soon as he's in the bed Lance turns away from him and is sleeping again. Keith feels a little hurt by that and touches Lance's shoulder blade, with just the tips of his fingers and sighs in relief when the pain stops. 

Lance turns a little to him in his sleep but doesn't turn over, and Keith watches Lance for a second. He looks peaceful and content, no nightmares like Keith sometimes has, slowly Keith falls asleep, with the pain gone he slips into the darkness willingly. 

_____

Keith walks down the castle halls, it's oddly quite and Keith feels unsettled. Where is everyone? Are they okay? Keith checks all over the castle, every room including spare or storage ones that were rarely used. He can't find anyone, not in any room, anywhere.

"Lance?" He calls.

Nothing, no sound.

"Hunk?" 

Nothing.

"Pidge?" 

Nothing.

"Shiro?" 

Still nothing. 

Keith begins to panic, what if something happened to them? What if the Galra had them? What if they were hurt? Keith starts breathing heavily and his hands shake, did something happen? He doesn't feel any pain, he seems okay physically. 

"NO, stop. Put me down, let go!” A familiar voice cries out, Keith knows that voice.

Lance.

"Lance?!" Keith yells down the halls, he can hear dragged feet and muffled chatter around the corner and he sprints in that direction.

"Keith!" Lance cries, there's a muffled yelp that follows and Keith pushes his body to move faster, he sees Lance's feet go around the corner and follows, his sword is somehow in his hand. "Keith." It's a whimper a cry for help so small, and it doesn't belong in Lance's voice. He turns and sees Galra soldiers dragging him away.

"Let go of him!” Keith yells, they both turn to him and one smirks, they drop Lance hard and Keith grinds his teeth, he charges them, kills the first one and then his vision tunnels out and he gives into the rage. He slashes without really seeing anything and when his vision clears the Galra is running away without even a scratch and Lance is laying on the floor, crimson staining the white floors of the hanger bay, Keith blinks looks down at his sword and finds it’s covered in Lance's blood. He lets out a giant sob and drops his sword, falling to Lance's side on his knees, tears leak from his eyes and Lance is looking at him with betrayal in his eyes, horror and Keith cries harder.

"Why Keith? Why did you kill me?" Lance chokes through a mouthful of blood, Keith stares at him pain blooming through his chest.

"I-I didn't kill you. This must be a dream." Keith mutters, Lance stares at him with terrified eyes.

"You killed me, you stabbed me, slashed at me until I was dead. Why?" Lance's sobs, tears spilling from his eyes. Keith watches Lance's face go blank and he sobs.

_____

Keith wakes up with a scream, Lance is in front of him with a worried look on his face. He's on his knees just in front of where Keith had been laying and he looks like when Keith woke up he had a mini heart attack. Keith is breathing heavily and all he can see is Lance's blank face, and unseeing eyes. Lance calls his name and Keith leaps at him, wrapping his arms tightly around him. Lance isn't expecting this and falls back on the bed, Keith presses his ear to Lance's chest and circles his arms around his waist, Lance freezes then slowly wraps his arms around Keith's back. Keith still can't believe that he killed Lance, that was a dream right?

"Keith what's wrong?" Lance asks softly. 

"I killed you. I said I would never hurt you and I did," Keith sobs quietly. "I killed you.” He sobs, Lance is very confused and furrows his brows. 

"No, Keith I'm right here. What are you talking about?" Lance says softly, Keith is murmuring to himself and crying. Lance is beyond scared. "Maybe we should go see Shiro what do ya think?" Lance asks brightly. Keith looks up at him and stares wide eyed at him. 

"No. No Shiro" Keith mumbles. Lance sighs and nods, stroking Keith's hair and playing with the ends, Lance lays back and Keith places his ear back on his chest. Lance slowly slips into unconsciousness.


	6. Waking up

Lance wakes up with a groan, there's a pain in his neck, his legs are cramped. This is the reason he hates having long legs, and sleeping with his legs curled up, he must have been comfortable if he hadn't moved and his legs started to cramp up. He feels a heavy weight on his chest and furrows his brows in confusion, what is that? 

Lance opens his eyes, and glances down at his chest to see Keith laying on his chest still asleep, his eyelashes are sitting on his cheek bones, his chest raising and falling softly. Lance smiles softly, and rubs his eyes. 

"Keith.” Lance mumbles sleepily, Keith stirs just a little but doesn't wake up. Lance shakes his shoulder a bit and mumbles his name, Keith still doesn't respond and Lance groans. He moves to shift Keith off of him, but Keith's arms tighten around him, in an almost vice grip. Lance is irritated with this, he really has to use the bathroom. 

"Lance, stop moving.” Keith complains and Lance huffs.

"Keith, I need to get up,” Lance says, annoyed. "I have to use the washroom.” He says.

"Will you come back after?" Keith mumbles and Lance dips his head in confirmation. Keith's arms loosen. "You better come back.” He says teasingly, with a lazy smile. 

Lance hums and slips out of the bed, and heads to the bathroom. He drags he's feet trying to stall and enjoy his time alone, Lance is getting a bit annoyed with the clingy part of Keith, he knows it's all fake and that's probably the worst part. He enters the bathroom and does his routine and slowly, ever slowly starts to make his way back to his room. Lance can hear hushed chatter and follows it into the kitchen, the others all seem to be discussing going back to Nalara, the castle needs more flower pollen for whatever it does. Lance really wants to see the planet again and the rain, he rushes into the room and all heads turn his way.

"Please let me go.” He blurts out, Shiro stares at him for a minute and then takes a glance around the table, no one objects, in fact they all seem surprised. 

"If that's alright with everyone else, then I think that's a.” Shiro starts to say, Pidge cuts him off.

"What about Keith?" She demands narrowing her eyes at Lance.

"What about him? I want to be away from him, I can go myself." Lance states and Hunk raises an eyebrow at him in question, Lance moves over to sit down and discuss the mission. "We just need the flower right?" Lance questions, everyone bows their heads in confirmation and Lance smiles.

"Then I can go myself, considering there's nothing dangerous down there. I just have to make sure I keep my helmet on.” Lance muses.

"If you go, you're telling Keith. I refuse to have his sword pointed at me again, once was enough.” Hunk rambles, Lance whines a little but signs off on the idea, then he won't try to hurt anyone, or think their trying to hide him from Keith. Lance suddenly realises he told Keith he was coming back to the room, he gets up quickly the chair screeches and everyone stares at Lance for a second.

"Told Keith I'd go back to the room, got to go before he freaks.” Lance says hurriedly, turning and sprinting out of the room quickly. He arrives at his room only a minute later and is panting because he was running so fast. He enters the room to find Keith curled up near the wall, with Lance's jacket on (hood up over his charcoal hair) and sleeping.

Lance sighs softly and goes over to him, if the others are up they probably slept in and neither of them have eaten yet. Lance walks over to Keith and shakes him awake, Keith furrows his brows and squints his eyes at Lance. Keith smiles lazily when he sees it's Lance, Lance smiles at him softly, in return. 

"Time to get up, the others are up and in the kitchen.” Lance announces, Keith groans.

"You said you would come back." He whines, Lance furrows his brows.

"What are you talking about? I'm right here.” Lance answers with a laugh. Keith frowns.

"No, I meant come back into bed and cuddle with me.” Keith cries in frustration his lip sticking out, Lance thinks it's adorable.

"I need to eat Keith.” Lance declares, Keith pouts at him.

"No, you should cuddle with me. Please" Keith cries in desperation.

"Keith please. I have to eat I'm starving and I bet you’re hungry." Lance says with a groan. 

"Fine,” Keith sighs, clearly irritated. "I am pretty hungry." He admits. 

Lance smiles brightly, and opens the door. Keith follows him out and that's when Lance remembers that he's going on a mission and he needs to tell Keith about it. He turns to Keith and smiles softly, Lance grabs Keith's hand and pulls him closer to the wall, Keith frowns at him in confusion. 

"So,” Lance drawls out. "I have to go back to the planet and get another flower, but I'm going alone, so I'll be gone for a little bit." Lance shifts from foot to foot nervously. Keith stares at him for a moment and then glares at him when he seems to get that Lance isn't joking.

"Can't I come with you?" Keith pouts, a sad look in his eyes, Lance sighs quietly.

"No Keith I have to go alone. That means no on is hiding me, so you better not attack or threaten any of the others." Lance orders lightly, his eyes harden into a glare. "I will hear about it if you do.” Lance glares at Keith, Keith pouts at him.

"Please, I don't want to be away from you." Keith whines, Lance groans.

"Keith, you can't come, okay! This is something I need to do on my own." Lance snaps, his face turning into a scowl. Keith retreats a little, and looks even more sad. "Look, I'm sorry.” Lance starts calmly, Keith looks up at him.

"I'm not going until a little after breakfast,” Lance continues "So, you can hang out with me until I go. I won't be gone long, and don't be too much trouble." 

"I'm not trouble.” Keith huffs, in offence.

"You very much are" Lance sing songs, Keith scowls at him in disapproval. "Let's get to the kitchen, I need food.” Lance declares loudly, and starts down the hall. Keith follows in annoyance, why couldn't he just go with Lance? Were the others trying to put space between them? Lance would fall out of love with him, Keith bets it's Shiro's fault, he's seen the way Shiro looks at Lance. He looks at him longingly, Keith growls under his breath, he won't let Shiro steal Lance from him.


	7. Mission

Keith pouts all through breakfast and Lance just ignores him unless Keith talks to him, but for the most part he's talking to the others. He can see Keith glaring at Shiro and frowns, he kicks Keith in the shin under the table, but doesn't look up at him. Keith scowls and turns to Lance fixing him with a glare and Lance is fine with that as long as he's not looking at Shiro like that. Keith turns to glare at Shiro again and Lance kicks him again, Keith glares at him. 

"What is your problem?" Keith hisses so only Lance can hear. Lance turns his head to look at him.

"Why are you glaring at Shiro?" Lance counters, Keith sighs and turns away from him with a scowl. "I need to talk to Keith quick, we'll be back.” Lance says quickly and grabs Keith's wrist dragging him out the door. Keith stumbles a little in surprise but rights himself.

Lance drags Keith a little further from the kitchen so that no one can hear what their saying, Keith is scowling. 

"What's going on with you?" Lance demands as soon as he stops, whirling around to face Keith. Keith stares at him for a moment.

"You want to know why I was glaring at Shiro.” It's more a statement then a question. 

"Yeah, he's your brother. What did he do?" Lance answers anyways. Keith watches him carefully. 

"He's trying to steal you, and apparently it's working.” Keith says with a growl, Lance starts to laugh.

"Are you serious? What is going on in that head of yours?" Lances questions in disbelief. "He is not trying to 'steal' me, and I can't believe you think he would like me in that way.” Lance continues, adding quotations at 'steal.'

Keith narrows his eyes. "You don't see the way he looks at you. He wants to steal you from me and I won't let him.” Keith's growls, baring his teeth. Lance rolls his eyes.

"Stop being a drama queen." Lance says hotly. "I'm done with this conversation.” Lance sighs, he goes to walk around Keith, but Keith grabs his wrist tightly, Lance winces. Keith tugs Lance back to him and is staring at him, in confusion. Lance raises an eyebrow in question, Keith shakes his head.

"You don't believe me? You think I'd lie?" Keith snaps, offended. Lance groans.

"No, I think your upset I'm not taking you on the mission and so you think Shiro is trying to split us apart, because you don't want to blame me. Even though I offered to go myself.” Lance explains, Keith's eyes go wide.

"You asked to go on this mission alone, why?" Keith questioned, looking at Lance suspiciously. 

"Because everyone else is exhausted.” Lance answers. "And I wanted to go back to the planet alone.”

Keith frowns "Fine, but that doesn't mean I still think Shiro doesn't like you, cause he does.” Keith huffs, Lance is annoyed.

"He doesn't Keith, knock it off. I'm not your possession and you don't own me, Shiro's not trying to steal me because I belong to myself, not you or him, or anyone else. Stop being a possessive asshole.” Lance snaps angrily, he's heated glare has Keith shrinking, Lance doesn't normally glare, but when he does it's scary as all hell. "I need to get going, I need to get more flowers for the castle." Lance mumbles.

Keith panics. "I'm sorry," He blurts out quickly, Lance nods and starts heading back to the kitchen. Telling the others he's leaving and heading out to Blue. "I'm sorry.” Keith mutters as Lance walks past, Lance fingers brush against his and Lance smiles softly at him, nodding trying to tell him it's fine. 

Lance heads to the hangers, he puts his armour on and goes to Blue. She purrs in the back of his head, sending her recurrences. A smile flickers across Lance's face briefly, he really hopes nothing happens well he's gone. Lance shakes his head trying to rid the thoughts, he gets into Blue's cockpit and she hums to life. 

The soft blue hue in the cockpit relives Lance and calms him, he puts his hands on the controls and feels his and Blue's essence become one, he can feel her happiness at having him flying her and her worry for him in general. Lance grins and pats the controls.

"Ready beautiful?" Lance asks, Blue roars in response and Lance's grin widens. He heads out of the hanger bay and toward the planet.

 Blue also seems to like this planet and it turns out that by the time they get down there it's still raining and Lance is in pure joy, just to see rain again, let alone walk in it. He lands Blue in a clearing and exits her, feeling the rain melt through his suit and relive his skin in a cool blast.  He shivers but instead of feeling the cold he feels amazing, the rain touching him doesn't feel cold even if his skin is reacting, he thinks it must be the excitement he really wants to take his helmet off, but he knows that if he does, one of those bugs could nip at him, and that would be a problem. Lance sighs, he's glad that he took this mission alone, he needed the alone time. Lance walks through the field of blue like sun flowers, he plucks one a sticks it in a separate pouch, he's going to ask Pidge to test it to make sure it's safe and if it is then he'll give it to his sister when they get back to Earth, Lance frowns. If they get back to Earth Lance thinks bitterly, he groans and shakes his mood change off, enjoying the feeling of cool rain leaking through his suit, he should probably talk to the others about the suits, he decides to just talk through the comms and turns his mic on.

"Hey guys, you there?" Lance questions. There’s slight static and then it connects.

"Yeah, what's up?" Pidge answers, she sounds tired and Lance makes a mental note to make sure she sleeps tonight. 

"I think we should get these suits fixed." Lance says, Pidge pauses for a second.

"What are you talking about?" Hunk's voice comes through. Lance stops in the field, he is going the wrong way, he turned left to see a clump of trees that could be called a forest up ahead, he pointed his scanner to that area and it started beeping louder, the flowers must be around there.

"It's raining on this planet and I can feel it through my suit.” Lance explains, walking in the direction of the forest. "So, I think we should change the material to protect us better, just in case we go on a planet that has acidic rain or whatever." 

"I think they are protected for that, hang on I'll go ask Allura.” Pidge replies, Lance hears shuffling then silence.

"You still there Hunk?"

"Yeah, yeah.” He says distractedly, he also sounds tired and Lance remembers the other reason he took this mission was so the others could catch up on some sleep.

"Hey, you guys should all go sleep. I mean everyone, that's why I took this mission so tell everyone to go to bed and if they refuse tell them I won't come back to the castle until they do.” Lance taunts fondly. Hunk sighs on the other end and there's more shuffling and clicks of what Lance thinks is metal against metal. 

"Lance, you still there?" Allura asks.

"Yeah, I'm here.” Lance says as he breaks through the flowers to go into the trees. He scans the floor but doesn't get the signal, of course Coran had thought the scanner would be easier than the coordinates. "Did Pidge talk to you?" Lance says when Allura doesn't respond.

"Yeah, I think all the suits are protected. So when you get back, I'm going to check your suit to make sure there isn't a tear or something like that in it.” Allura says quickly, Lance doesn't know what's going on in the castle but everyone seems, tired and distracted.

"Princess, I think all of you should get some sleep.” Lance declares, Allura pauses what she's doing then continues.

"There's no time for that now.” She says, Lance sighs.

"No, you all need sleep." Lance disagrees. "Pidge hasn't slept in about two days, and I know Pidge, I woke up late to use the bathroom and heard you doing something. I was going to go make sure you'd go to sleep but Keith came stumbling down the hallway, half asleep and upset because I left the room. Coran was with Pidge, I'm pretty sure I heard him trying to convince her to sleep and helped her when she didn't want to. Shiro has nightmares almost daily, and woke up last night, I'm pretty sure he stayed awake, I heard him muttering while Keith was dragging me back to the room. Hunk was stress baking last night, I could smell it while Keith dragged me. And you Allura were in the control room scanning for Galra ships almost all night. Keith and I were probably the only ones who got a good sleep, and he also had a nightmare." Lance informed annoyed. 

"The only reason he's probably sleeping so well is that stupid bug. SO please can you all just sleep.” He added with a sigh of exhaustion.

Lance scanner started beeping like crazy, he looks around and found the flower they needed. It was a violet colour and it's stem was also blue, Lance thinks they only needed a few and decided to start digging them up.

"Okay, your right we could all use some sleep.” Allura said. Lance smiled to himself.

"How many flowers did we need?"

"Only about four" Allura responded. "I think you better hurry Keith is rampaging again, he keeps glaring at Shiro.” Allura sighs tiredly. Lance can hear muffled foot steps and then a muffled voice.

"Lance, can I hurt someone now?" Keith voice sounds tight with irritation and Lance wants to scream.

"Don't you dare Keith, I'm coming back right now.” Lance rushes to say. He finishes up and starts sprinting back to Blue.

"Shiro is trying to keep us a part.” Keith hushes.

"Not this again, we talked about this Keith.” Lance grumbles.

"I can see it Lance, even if you can't." Keith replies displeased.

"I'm on my way back don't do anything stupid.” Lance sighs.


	8. Side effects

"But he's trying to keep us apart, doesn't that make you upset?" Keith demands annoyed Lance is brushing him off. He can see the way Shiro watches Lance like he wants to kiss him or cuddle him. Lance still isn't back yet, and it's getting on Keith's nerves.

"Keith, shut up." Lance snaps. "Shiro isn't doing anything, if you touch him in a threatening way I won't talk to you EVER again.” Lance continues trying to get the point across, Keith scowls.

"Fine, but you better hurry up,” Keith sighs. "I can't  promise anything if you don't hurry up.”

"I'm getting into Blue now.” Lance says, Keith can hear Lance breathing and some shuffling before Blue's rumble can be heard. "Let's go beautiful." Lance says to her and Keith can picture his grin. Shiro walks into the room, and Keith glares at him but doesn't move, or say anything.

"Is Lance on his way back?" Shiro asks looking at Keith calmly, Keith bites back a growl.

"Yeah, he's already in Blue." Keith replies carefully as much as he can without gritting his teeth. Shiro sighs in what sounds like relief, Keith frowns. "What are you so worried about?" Keith questions.

"I wasn't really, just a little nervous. Lance sometimes goofs off and I thought he might on this planet and hurt himself, especially because he is by himself." Shiro explains with a fond expression. Keith can't hold back his growl when he sees that look, especially when he's talking about Lance. Shiro gives him a startled look and furrows his brows.

Keith lunges at Shiro, Shiro is caught off guard, they fall to the floor knocking over a bunch of Hunk's tools. The others while probably hear it and come see what's going on. Keith bares his teeth in Shiro's face, and he tries to get as far away from Keith as he can. Shiro is still frowning but it looks like he's concerned which makes Keith angrier. He wraps his hand around Shiro's throat and growls, Shiro sputters and gasps for breathe at Keith's grip, clawing at his hand, Keith doesn't let go.   

"He. Is. Mine" Keith growls out, there are running footsteps and then the others are looking down at Keith choking Shiro.

"Keith, buddy. Stop you're hurting Shiro" Hunk says nervously. Keith looks up with a snarl.

"He's trying to take Lance from me.” Keith's voice lowers dangerously. 

"No one's taking Lance from you Keith." Allura replies calmly and without hesitation. 

"You don't see the way he looks at him. Shiro looks like he wants him, and Lance is mine." Keith claims.

Pidge goes up to the comms and turns them on, trying to get a hold of Lance.

"Lance come in.” She orders. There's static for a minute.

"Pidge what's wrong?" Lance inquires.

"You're on your way back to the castle right? If your not get your ass back here now and if you are tell Blue to hurry her ass up.” Pidge demands quickly, Shiro is turning red from lack of oxygen.

"What's happening?" Lance questions cautiously. Pidge huffs a breathe through her nose in irritation.

"Keith is hurting Shiro. He has a hand around his neck, pinning him to the floor and choking him,” Pidge sighs. "Please hurry.” She whispers.

"Tell Keith to talk to me through the comm.” Lance demands voice hard, Pidge hates when he sounds like that.

"I don't think he'll-" Pidge begins but Lance cuts her off.

"Pidge, tell him I need to talk to him right now.” Lance snaps voice shaking.

"Keith, Lance is on the comms he needs to talk to you.” Pidge hollers, Keith's head snaps toward her, but he doesn't move.

"Turn the volume up, so I can hear him from here." He orders. Pidge does and nods at Keith.

"Okay Lance your a go.” Pidge says softly.

"Keith, what are you doing?" Lance asks quietly. Keith pauses at the question, he turns back and stares and Shiro and loosens his grip enough for Shiro to breath, Shiro wheezes out a cough and winces. He's breathing in gasps and Hunk winces at the sound of his breathing.

"I-I- Lance I already told you.” Keith states. Lance doesn't say anything for a minute and Keith looks away from Shiro. 

"I'm pulling in the hanger bay now.” Lance finally says with a defeated sigh. "Why don't you let Shiro go and come meet me.” Keith watches Shiro carefully.

"Yeah, okay. You’re not mad?" Keith questions quietly. There's a pause and then Pidge sees that Lance has pulled up a private comm line, that at the moment only she can see.

"Pidge as soon as he is off Shiro, you need to restrain him.” Lance whispers. "This is the second time and we can't risk another.”

"Lance, I don't know about this. Maybe you should just let him come to you and then you can do something. He won't attack you, but he will attack us, if we get in the way of him getting to you." Pidge replies in a whisper. Pidge looks over to see Keith still in the same position seeming to wait for Lance's response. "Answer him Lance.” Pidge hushes.

Lance switches channels back. "No Keith, I'm not mad. Not at the moment anyway. That might change if I see the marks on Shiro,” Lance replies voice still hard, "I'm in the hanger bay now, get off Shiro and meet me.” Lance orders sharply.

Keith jumps off of Shiro and is out the door before anyone can say anything, Pidge and Hunk run to Shiro as he coughs harshly. He has finger shaped bruises around his throat and the bruises are very sensitive, they are purple and blueish. Pidge is very angry at Keith and really does want to kick his ass like she said she would. Hunk is worried about Shiro's vocal cords and if he needs to be put in the healing pod. Coran walks in, once what happened is explained to him, Coran wants to hunt Keith down and give him a long lecture (they mange to talk her out of it for now) Hunk is worried about what he might do to Lance, they decide that Shiro will go into the healing pod after Lance sees the damage Keith has done and how serious it is. They also decide to not let Lance go on a mission without Keith.

_____

Keith sprints to the hanger bay, finally Lance is back. He rounds the corner and Lance is at the end of the hallway, walking toward him. Keith smiles brightly and sprints faster and jumps at Lance the first chance he gets. Lance stumbles back, falling on his butt, he grunts but doesn't say anything or wrap his arms around Keith. Keith frowns and backs up to look at Lance's face, Lance has a sharp look on his face, Keith now knows he lied, Lance is pissed. He glares at Keith, Keith backs away and gets up.

"I thought you said you weren't angry." Keith mutters, Lance gives him a pointed look.

"I was almost back, couldn't you have just waited in the hanger bay for me?" Lance asks, voice hard. Keith flinches, and looks down.

"I'm sorry, but he had this very fond expression on his face when he was talking about you. You’re mine not his, he can't look like that.” Keith argued, Lance exhales loudly.

"Keith, I am my own person. I'm not something anyone can posses and you need to get over it, we're Shiro's family of course he'll use fond expressions when talking about us,” Lance replies annoyed. "You don't have a right to attack him for that.” Lance says softly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like this is becoming a little extra so uh, hopefully y'all like it...


	9. I'm sorry to say

"Keith, I am my own person. I'm not something anyone can posses and you need to get over it, we're Shiro's family of course he'll use fond expressions when talking about us.” Lance replies annoyed. "You don't have a right to attack him for that.” Lance says softly, standing up.

Keith doesn't look up from the floor, he feels ashamed. He doesn't understand why he's so possessive over Lance, but Lance is his even if he doesn't think so. Which hurts Keith, he can tell Lance likes him, he was swooning when Keith had kissed him.

"We're going to see Shiro and I swear to God Keith if you so much as glare at him, I will lose my shit with you." Lance says sharply, eyes burning with a fire Keith has never seen before. He shirks back, but nods. 

Lance seems satisfied with that and stalks out of the room, speed walking down the halls, he moves to the medical bay. Sure enough everyone's in there, they all turn when the door opens and Hunk looks away from Keith almost immediately upon seeing him, he shrinks further into the wall he's leaning on. Shiro keeps his eyes on Lance, and makes sure they’re emotionless, he doesn't even spare Keith a glance. Coran fixes him with a cold stare and looks just as furious as Lance did. Allura's sharp eyes are watching him with pure rage, her fingers twitching. Pidge doesn't look at him at all either, her gaze is hard and cold, detached, she's furious that much is obvious and Keith shrinks into himself, he doesn't know what to do. Lance however strides right up to Shiro and Keith's heart breaks at the look in Lance's eyes. It's sorrow and rage mixed together but he can't settle on one.

"I'm so sorry Shiro.” Lance sobs and Keith deems that worse than the look Lance had given Shiro, his eyes had been on the finger shaped bruises since he walked over to their leader. Shiro gives him a confused look, furrowing his brows.

"This wasn't your fault, Lance.” Shiro says his voice scratchy, Lance lets a couple tears fall and then wraps arms around Shiro's shoulders and hugs him tightly, Shiro side eyes Keith before gently wrapping his arms around Lance's back. Lance stays like that, hugging Shiro and Keith feels even worse for feeling jealous over that.

Lance leans closer to Shiro ear, and whispers.

"What should we do about Keith? I was going to ask Pidge to restrain him, but she made a good point, that he would've attacked anyone that got in between.” Lance pauses, "Us.” He chokes out. Shiro hunches further down so he's level with Lance's ear.

"I honestly think, we should restrain him until it wears off, we're going to have to find a peaceful planet to land on, but first find the bug that bit Keith. You can bring him his meals this way he doesn't lose contact with you and doesn't attack anyone else.” Shiro mutters into Lance's ear. 

"Which room should I take him to?" Lance asks, they'd have to get Pidge to activate the lock for the door, but only be able to open it from the outside.

"Just his room, Pidge can deactivate the locks. But you'll have to stay in there until it's locked." Shiro answers softly, his voice sounds like someone scraped sandpaper down his throat.

Lance backs away from Shiro with a nod, then walks out the door grabbing Keith's wrist on the way out. Lance doesn't turn to look at Keith and Keith doesn't say anything either, he just walks behind Lance quickly and quietly with no argument. Lance is still fuming and he wants to smack Keith upside the head and scream profanities at him, the other part wants to lock him in his room and not come back. He thinks the best punishment for Keith would be for him to not see Lance at all, not even for meals, but then he reminds himself that the only reason he did it was because of that stupid bug, he gets the falling in love with part (not really) but the violent and possessiveness is getting annoying. 

Lance enters Keith's room and let's Keith's wrist fall, but doesn't turn to face him just yet. Keith feels horrible, but in a sense he doesn't, Shiro was going after what was his, and Keith doesn't share. Shiro of all people should know that, if anything he's only guilty because it upset Lance. He upset Lance, and that thought alone drives Keith crazy. Keith looks at Lance's back that's turned to him and sees that he's breathing heavily, which means he's still angry.

"I-I just don't understand.” Lance mutters, he turns slowly and stares at Keith. "Shiro is your brother, why would you try to hurt him? And how do you not feel guilty for attacking him?" Lance exclaims, Keith stands there watching Lance carefully.

"I do feel guilty, but he was trying to take what was mine and I don't share.” Keith states, simply. Lance stares at Keith in astonishment.

"You're kidding right?" Lance questions, narrowing his eyes. Keith frowns at him and shakes his head. "Keith, we've been over this! You can't own a person, okay. It's not possible!" Lance snaps at him, he needs to leave this room or he might say something he'll regret. Lance exhales heavily.

"I don't know why your getting so angry." Keith answers softly and Lance watches him in bewilderment. 

"How am I even supposed to not get mad? If you had held Shiro any longer you could have killed him, not to mention the fact that there are bruises on his neck because of you! And I was literally flying right to the castle and you couldn't have restrained yourself?" Lance is raising his voice at Keith in a blind fury. Keith’s eyes widen, and he looks to the floor then back at Lance.

"I wasn't going to kill him.” Keith says calmly, "You thought I would've killed him?" Keith questions softly. 

"I don't know what you would've done. I know the you not bitten by the bug wouldn't have killed Shiro or hurt him, but this you I have no idea what to expect.” Lance sighs, Keith nods. Partly understanding what Lance means. 

There's a knock on Keith's door, Keith frowns.

"Come in.” Lance calls out, Keith turns and away from the door to look at Lance. Shiro's at the door and go figure he's looking for Lance not Keith.

"Can I borrow Lance for a minute?" He asks firmly, staring Keith down, almost in challenge. Keith nods and watches as Lance brushes past Keith to walk towards Shiro.

"Is everything okay?" Lance asks when their outside the door, Shiro watches the door for a minute before tugging Lance further away from it.

"Pidge has Keith's hand print locked out, only all of us can open it, but you'll probably be the only one seeing him. I don't know if this is a good idea though, enclosing him in a room.” Shiro explains quickly, Shiro turns his head to the door and frowns.

"It's fine Shiro, if it doesn't work I'll just make sure to stay with him at all times" Lance replies with a soft smile, he pats Shiro on the shoulder and goes back into Keith's room.

Keith is laying on the bed when Lance comes in and looks up when the door opens, Lance avoids his gaze and sits on the bed by his feet, he should probably explain to Keith that he's going to be stuck in here for awhile.

"So,” Keith says breaking Lance's train of thought, "what did Shiro want?" He asks, without looking at Lance.

"Well, about that" Lance trails off, Keith furrows his brows at Lance. This will be fun Lance thinks.


	10. He what?

"Well, about that." Lance trails off, Keith regards him curiously.

"Did he do something to you?" Keith asks sitting up quickly, he racks his eyes over Lance's body looking for injuries.

"What? No, of course not." Lance exclaims in surprise, waving his hands at Keith dismissively.

"Then what's going on?" Keith narrows his eyes slightly, in suspicion.

"Well, because you have now attacked two members of the team -attempted or otherwise- your being confined to your room, until about after the big bite wears off, or we trust that you won't hurt anyone." Lance explains as lightly as possible, Keith looks confused then processes what Lance just said, he's expression changes to rage. He eyes Lance and glares.

"This was Shiro's idea wasn't it?" Keith snarls, Lance frowns at Keith. Keith gets up and walks to the door, placing his hand on the panel. When it doesn't open he turns to Lance and glares at him.

"Open the door Lance." Keith growls, Lance narrows his eyes at Keith.

"No." He simply says, Keith gaps at him.

"Lance! Open it." Keith demands, Lance glares at him.

"No." He repeats more firmly.

"Lance, I know you don't see it, but Shiro is trying to-" Keith is cut off by Lance.

"No, he's not. It was my idea." Lance declares angrily, Keith looks at him in surprise before it turns into a look of betrayal. Lance sighs and faces Keith.

"We can't have you hurting anyone else Keith," Lance says defeated. "You tried to hurt Hunk and then you hurt Shiro." Keith pouts at him.

"You'll stay with me right?" Keith softly asks, walking and sitting next to Lance, he places his head on Lance's shoulder and sighs.

"Yeah, I'll be bringing you food for every meal." Lance mutters.

"Are you going to sleep in here with me?" Keith questions raising his head with a raised eyebrow.

"No, Keith. I will be sleeping in my own room." Lance declares, Keith pouts up at him.

"But I can't sleep without you." He whines, Lance groans.

"Close your eyes and sleep," says Lance simply. "And you'll be asleep." Keith pouts at Lance.

"But Lance." He whines giving Lance the famous puppy dog eyes, Lance is glad that the lights in Keith's room are dimmed, that way Keith can't see him blush. Keith looks absolutely adorable when he does that, and Lance wants to kiss him. 

He knows it's wrong and that Keith isn't in his right mind, but god does he want to kiss the boy in front of him. Keith seems to be thinking the same thing, he leans closer to Lance, and lets their lips brush, as if waiting for Lance to give his say so. Lance can't take it anymore and surges forward, crashing their lips together clumsily. Lance kisses Keith hard and unpractised and feels in utter bliss, Keith sighs into the kiss pushing his tongue just a little bit into Lance's mouth for a taste. Lance moans into the kiss, fingers coming up to thread themselves into Keith's silky, black hair. Lance tugs Keith's hair to direct his head a certain way to kiss him better, and gracefully slides his own tongue into Keith's mouth, he tugs Keith's hair again and Keith moans. Lance's eyes widen and he pulls at Keith's mullet again, Keith moans again and Lance grins into the kiss.

Lance breaks the kiss and Keith looks dazed. Black hair out of place and ruffled, with swollen lips and unfocused eyes, directed at Lance. Keith exhales slowly and comes in for another kiss just as good as the first one if not better.

"I love you Lance" Keith murmurs, in between the kisses and Lance rears back, suddenly remembering that Keith has no control over this and when he finds out when the bit wears off, he'll be disgusted with Lance and reject him. Lance's head spins and he feels panic crawl it's way up his throat. Keith watches him with confusion, Lance does like him and enjoyed the kiss, so what is going on.

"I'm so sorry Keith." Lance mutters, and Keith furrows his brow. "I-we can't do that again.” Lance says, Keith moves towards him, but Lance is faster and shoots right off the bed and hurling himself across the room. Keith frowns at Lance.

"Lance, what are you talking about?" Keith questions anxiously.

"When-when your back to normal, you'll hate me. Even if you want to kiss me now you won't later on.” Lance replies quickly. Keith narrows his eyes, he thought they were past this.

"Lance, we've been over this already. When I'm back to normal, I'll still love you.” Keith declares boldly, he makes a move toward Lance, but he moves backwards, trying to scramble away from Keith. Keith sighs reaching a hand out to Lance.

"Come on Lance, how many more times do I have to say it for you to get it?” Keith asks. "I love you." He says and Lance's eyes widen.

"No!" He all but screams. "No you don't. That bug, it's making you love me, you won't love me after it wears off, you'll hate me again.” Lance has tears welling in his eyes that breaks Keith's heart.

"No, Lance I could never hate you." Keith cries, eye widening in horror. Lance lets a tear fall and Keith runs forward quickly, wrapping Lance in his arms and burying his face into Lance's shoulder. Lance sobs into his hair and Keith can feel the tears hit his scalp. Keith rubs Lance's back and shushes him, while Lance mutters about Keith not loving him and hating him when the bite wears off. Keith continues to shush him and and rub his back, one of his hands go into Lance's soft brown hair and rubs soothingly at the skin there. Lance slowly starts to calm down, sobs turning into hiccups. Keith keeps muttering soft reassurances, Lance lowers his head onto Keith's shoulder and Keith stops talking. Lance stays almost completely still, hardly moving an inch. 

"Lance?" Keith questions softly, Lance looks up at him tiredly. 

"I have to go." Lance says suddenly, making his way towards the door.

"Lance." Keith calls trying to grab Lance's wrist. He misses and Lance walks out the door, it slides shut and Keith tries to go after Lance when he remembers that he can't get out.

"Lance!" He yells through the door, he's meet with silence.


	11. Kissed him?

Lance rushes out of Keith's room in a hurry, he doesn't know where he should go or what he should do, he feels like a bad person for taking advantage of Keith. Maybe he should go to Shiro to get scolded, or maybe to Hunk for comfort. He's stuck, but he thinks he should go talk to Shiro, he'd help him right? He'd comfort him but also scold him wouldn't he? Lance shakes his head and heads to Shiro's room, he paces in front of the door for a minute and then raises his hand to knock. Before he can knock Shiro opens the door, he glances at Lance and his eyes widen.

"Lance, hey everything okay?" Shiro asks softly, his throat looks a little better the bruises fading just a little bit, but there still there and Lance feels like that's his fault.

"Hey, uh can I talk to you?" Lance rubs the back of his neck nervously. Shiro nods, stepping aside so Lance can come into his room.

"What's on your mind?" Shiro watches as Lance begins to pace the room, he furrows his brows at the teen.

"I-I kissed Keith" Lance blurts out, that makes Shiro falter. "I kissed him and he's under the affect of this stupid bug, and I took advantage of that. Why aren't you yelling at me? You should be yelling or just doing something." Lance rants in a panic.

"Okay, Lance. How about we calm down, yeah?" Shiro walks forward but Lance doesn't quit his pacing. Shiro watches him in concern. "I'm not going to yell at you." He conclude carefully.

Lance stops pacing. "What do you mean, your not going to yell at me?" Lance screeches, "I deserve to be yelled at, I'm a horrible person. Keith isn't himself right now. When the bit wears off he'll hate me." Lance declares starting to pace again.

Shiro reaches out and grabs a hold of Lance's shoulders to stop his pacing, Lance watches him and looks as though he's ready to get yelled at. Shiro sighs.

"I may not agree with you kissing Keith, without him being able to consent but I don't think Keith would mind all that much." Shiro declares softly, Lance furrows his brow.

"No, Shiro he hates me and to be kissed by me. He won't talk to me ever again." Lance replies nervously running a hand through his hair.

Shiro laughs. "Lance why don't you relax a little, if he does get angry just tell him you said no but he insisted, I mean that did happen before didn't it?" Shiro questions, "in this very hallway?" He muses.

Lance stops short at that, staring at Shiro with wide eyes.

"You seen us?" He asks in bewilderment. Lance eyes Shiro with a half glare.

"Yeah, I did. I figured you had it handled." Shiro responds lightly, "and what do you know you did." Shiro laughs. Lance giggles a little, a soft laugh but a laugh nonetheless. It warms Shiro's heart, he's glad he made Lance feel better.

"Thanks Shiro, I knew there was a reason I came to you." Lance's shoulders have relaxed and he seems brighter. He smiles at Shiro and then turns to leave the room.

"Hey, Lance?" Shiro calls out to him quickly. Lance turns to him with a curious look.

"Yeah?"

"Keith's not still on the whole, Shiro likes you thing is he?" Shiro asks reluctantly. Lance studies Shiro curiously for a second.

"No of course not." Lance lies, he doesn't want Shiro to worry. Lance already knows he doesn't like him, in that way anyways.

Shiro breathes a sigh of relief and Lance smiles at him before taking his leave. It's only been about 6 days since Keith has been bitten and Coran says, he thinks it will last another week. Lance doesn't think he can handle anymore of Keith acting all loving toward him, and trying to hurt the others. He knows its not real, and that's what bothers Lance. Lance sighs and makes his way to the kitchen to get Keith his food, he doesn't really want to see Keith at the moment but he has to. He grabs a bowls of space goo for Keith and himself, he'll eat with Keith so that Keith can see him more than just again at supper.

He gets to Keith's door and opens it. Keith is pacing near the bed and when Lance opens the door Keith looks up and breaths a sigh of relief. He lunges at Lance and wraps his arms around Lance's neck, Lance stumbles a little. He makes sure to keep their food steady, and doesn't even bother to move at all, he stays completely still. Keith stays like that and sighs contently, Lance doesn't really know what to do.

"I thought you wouldn't come back." Keith sighs, smiling widely at Lance as he pulls away from him, just to see his face, before pulling him back into a hug.

Lance frowns at that, he decides not to say anything at all. Keith finally steps away from Lance and Lance just hands Keith the bowl of green space goo, he hands him the bowl so it's in between them and no touching is required. Keith seems a little hurt at the action, but Lance brushes it off.

"I'll sit with you for a bit, then I have to go." Lance mutters without looking at Keith. Keith frowns at him, narrowing his eyes.

"I can't sleep without you in here Lance." He states simply, Lance looks up from his bowl at him and blinks.

"Okay, I'll sleep in here then." Lance replies eyeing Keith carefully. Keith smiles at Lance.

"Why don't you just stay here then?" Keith requests with a grin, he looks a little weird to Lance at the moment, like he's planning something.

"I will, but I just have to check with Shiro about something." Lance declares, Keith eyes him and then nods. Keith can feel jealously bubble to the surface and tries to push it down.


	12. Keith's excitement

Lance exits Keith's room and heads to the kitchen to put away their dishes to later be washed. After that's done, he heads towards Shiro's room to talk to him about Keith, Lance exhales. He walks up to the door and reaches out and knocks gently, Shiro opens the door and Lance smiles shyly at him. Shiro looks surprised to see him, but smiles back all the same.

"What can I do for you Lance?" Shiro questions, with a small tilt of his head. Which Lance thinks is adorable, in a Shiro like way.

"I think we should let Keith out of his room." Lance blurts out, Shiro narrows his eyes a little and before he can say anything, Lance rushes to continue. "As long as he doesn't try to harm anyone on the team, and if it helps anyone, I'll stay with him at all times. Not when he's asleep or in the bathroom obviously, but when he's around the others." Lance babels, Shiro looks confused for a second and looks at Lance curiously.

"Why do you suddenly want him to be out of his room? Didn't you agree to keep him there until we could either trust him, or the bite wore off?" Shiro asks raising an eyebrow at Lance.

Lance nodded in confirmation, then explained. "It's just, he always wants me to stay with him, but I really don't want to. He keeps trying to kiss or hug me and it gets to be too much."

Shiro gives him a look, like he knows the only reason why it gets to be too much is because Lance has a crush on Keith. Lance flushes in embarrassment.

"Why don't we got talk to the others and make sure there okay with it." Shiro smiles softly at Lance and Lance nods in agreement.

They head toward the common area, where Pidge and Hunk are. Allura and Coran weren't in the castle. Shiro and Lance approach them, Pidge and Hunk look up and they both have matching grins.

"You want to what?!" Pidge demands, eyes wide. "Are you forgetting that he tried to attack Hunk and DID attack Shiro?" She raises an eyebrow at both of them. Lance nods guiltily.

"Which is why were asking you guys if you would trust him with another chance." Shiro declares, and Lance nods.

"I'll make sure that I'm with him, so he can't hurt anyone." Lance interjects and Pidge studies them carefully, while Hunk shifts from on foot to the other.

"Hunk what do you think?" Shiro asks, with a soft expression. Hunk watches them all, thinking over his answer.

"I mean don't get me wrong, I'll be terrified of him at first, but I'll get over it. I think it's fine, plus he won't hurt anyone with Lance around." Hunk responds softly, with a nod towards Lance.

"Pidge what do you think?" Shiro questions, turning his gaze to her, she sighs.

"If you and Hunk are okay with it, then fine." She says, she turns to look at Lance with a serious expression. "You better make sure he doesn't hurt anyone though." She glares lightly at him and Lance nods.

"What do you think Shiro?" Hunks asks, Shiro tilts his head again and thinks carefully about the question.

"I think, he'll be fine as long as Lance is around. Right now I don't trust Keith, but I trust Lance." Shiro says, he turns and smiles lightly at Lance. Lance nods and smiles back.

"Alright, Lance go get Keith then." Pidge declares, pushing her glasses up her nose.

__

Lance walks down the castle hallway, playing with his fingers and trying to remain calm. He takes a deep breath before, knocking at Keith's door and walking in when Keith allows him to. Lance smiles when he walks in, facing Keith whose laying on his bed watching Lance curiously, with a soft smile. 

"I have some good news." Lance says to Keith and grins at him, Keith tilts his head, something that Lance thinks he probably picked up from Shiro. 

"What is it?" Keith asks, standing up in front of Lance.

"If you promise not to hurt anyone again, you can stay out of your room." Lance grins and Keith breaks into a large smile, he wraps Lance in his arms for a hug with a laugh. Lance laughs too and they stand there for a second hugging.

Keith backs up to look up at Lance. "You're being serious?" He questions, his face loosing the smile, Lance frowns.

"Yeah, I talked to the rest of the team and they approved the idea." Lance replies with a proud smirk. Keith narrows his eyes at Lance in suspicion.

"What did you think?" He tilts his head again and Lance blushes and looks away.

"It was my idea." He mumbles, Keith pauses and stares at Lance for a second, before jumping to hug him again. Lance stumbles a little, taken by surprise.

"Can we go out know?" Keith questions and Lance smiles and nods his head, Keith grabs his hand and leads him out of the room, which lets him out of it this time.

He leads Lance to the training room, and Lance is suddenly nervous. Does Keith want to train with Lance, he's pretty aggressive when it comes to training.

"Want to train with me?" Keith asks innocently, and when he asks like that how can Lance say no?

"Yeah, sure." Lance responds, fidgeting with his hands. Keith grins broadly at Lance and Lance can't help but crack a smile.

____

They start with hand to hand combat, which Lance is actually somewhat better at than the rest of the training Keith likes to do, he obviously hardly beats Keith, because hello this is Keith we're talking about here. He does block a lot of his hits though, and avoids being thrown around too much. Sort of, and sometimes when Keith does get him to the ground they both end up laughing at each other on the floor, in whatever position they landed in.

Keith helps Lance get to his feet and they go for another round of sparing. Lance blocks most of the hits fairly well, but Keith is Keith and becomes just a little bit more aggressive, trying to win the match. He sweeps under Lance's feet to which Lance jumps and then he right hooks Lance, which lands, he then sweeps his leg casing Lance to fall to the floor roughly.

Lance's breath is knocked out of him and he smacks his head against the floor hard, causing black spots to pass through his vision. Lance groans and lays there, Keith runs to his side in a panic.


	13. Lance's pain

Lance groans and lays there pain blooming in his head and back. Keith rushes to his side in panic, he went to far again and now Lance is hurt, this wasn't what he wanted to happen.

"Lance are you okay?" Keith asks crouched beside him. Keith's heart is racing and he doesn't know how to help Lance.

Lance laughs and Keith watches him carefully. "Yeah, I'm good. Wasn't expecting that I guess." He sighs and moves into a sitting position. "I think that's enough training for today." Lance says and Keith nods eagerly.

"Why don't we go find the others, I still need to apologise to Shiro." Keith suggests and Lance smiles at him.

"Sounds good." Lance says.

They walk to the kitchen to find them all sitting around the table, Shiro tense the tiniest bit as his eyes land on Keith and Lance winces. He grabs Keith's wrist and drags Keith to sit next to him at the table, across from the others and Keith frowns at Lance, and looks like he wants to go sit with Shiro, or talk with him. Lance's hand doesn't move from his wrist and Keith sighs and slumps in his chair with a pout, Shiro gives him a grateful look.

Pidge doesn't look at either of them and Hunk looks around nervously between all of them, Pidge is obviously still angry and that has Hunk and Lance on edge, they know how she gets when she's mad and it isn't pretty. Lance squeezes Keith's wrist, and when Keith looks at him, he gives him a look and nods towards Shiro. Keith nods and clears his throat, Shiro looks up and watches him, Pidge is listening and Hunk still looks nervous.

"Shiro, I um. I wanted to apologise for what happened, I don't know what got into me and I'm really sorry that it happened and I let it get that far." Keith explains and Shiro nods in acknowledgement of his statement, but doesn't say anything.

Keith clenches his jaw and becomes upset, he apologised why isn't Shiro saying anything. He clenches his hand into a fist, and Lance, holding his wrist realises right away. He stands up with Keith and gives him a dirty look, one Keith doesn't catch.

"Alright guys, we'll see you later." Lance grins, trying to come across as casual.

He high tails it out of the room, dragging a fuming Keith behind him. Lance doesn't understand what Keith is so angry about, it's obvious why Shiro didn't say anything. Maybe Keith just doesn't know that. Lance goes to his room and the door shuts behind the two of them.

Lance whirls on Keith. "What's your problem?" He demands and Keith looks offended and stares at him.

"My problem I apologised and he didn't say anything." Keith responds and glares at Lance. "He could've said something." Keith looks furious and Lance just stares at him.

"You attacked him." Lance accused, "of course he wouldn't have said anything right away." Keith frowns at Lance, Lance rubs his temples and sighs.

"I was jealous, he likes you Lance. He was keeping us away from each other." Keith pouts at Lance.

Lance stares at Keith in bewilderment, "and you think that makes it okay for you to attack him?!" Lance is getting angry with this stupid bug bite already. "I've told you already, you don't really love me. It's that stupid bug bite." Lance's eyes are tearing up and he stares at Keith.

"And I told you that isn't true. I do love you Lance." Keith steps closer to Lance, but Lance back away from him.

"You don't!" Lance yells, tears falling over his cheeks, "you don't love me, that bug makes you think you do." Lance is sobbing and he doesn't know if he can stop.

Keith's heart breaks just seeing Lance upset. "Lance." He says softly, he wants to comfort Lance, but Lance keeps moving away from him. "I love you." 

Lance sobs louder when he hears that, Keith doesn't know what to do. He's telling the truth and Lance keeps rejecting him. Keith starts to tear up, and moves forward until Lance's back is against the wall.

"Lance please, I love you." Keith moves to hold Lance's hand, Lance's tears just keep falling and he sinks to the floor and put his knees against his chest.

"You don't, you don't." He mutters, Keith gets on his knees and hugs Lance tightly, just letting him sob in his arms.

_____

At some point Lance cries himself to sleep and Keith places Lance in the bed, he curls around him trying to keep him close. Lance mumbles in his sleep and cuddles closer to Keith. Keith smiles softly at Lance and holds him closer. Keith thinks about what Lance was saying about Shiro and it does make sense, even if he was jealous he didn't have the right to hurt Shiro, even if he was trying to keep both him and Lance apart.

Keith leaves the room and lets Lance sleep, his chest is starting to tighten and he doesn't like that Lance has been rejecting him, or thinking he doesn't love Lance. Keith really does love Lance, more than he's ever loved anyone. Keith goes to the kitchen to get some food, he's hungry and Lance has been asleep for awhile, he doesn't seem to be waking up anytime soon.

Pidge is sitting at the table on her laptop when the doors open for Keith. She flicks a glance in his direction and then her gaze returns to her laptop, Keith chooses to ignore her for the time being and focus on getting some food, he's starving. It's been a couple hours since he's eaten anything, longer since he's been outside of his room.

"Where's Lance?" Pidge asks, eyes still on her computer screen.

"Asleep in his room." Keith says without looking up at Pidge.

"We heard your argument and just so you know Lance is like a second big brother to me, if you hurt him I won't be happy. Neither will Hunk being his best friend and all." Pidge watches him as she says this and Keith decides to give her his attention.

"I don't want to hurt Lance, I love him." Keith declares and Pidge narrows her eyes at him.

"That's what you say now, but that's just the effect of the bug bite. You think you love him. That warning was for when your back to normal." Pidge observes Keith carefully and then smiles at him. "He really does like you and if you hurt him, it won't be pretty." Pidge shakes her head.

"As for Shiro, I think that when he's ready he'll talk to you. Even if you were jealous you had no right to harm him. Lance doesn't feel that way about Shiro, I don't even think he knew he liked guys and girls until you." Pidge sighs, "hopefully you don't remember that if you don't actually feel the same way." Keith is attentive the whole time and when she's finished speaking he smiles softly, the first time he's done so without Lance around.

"Like I said I don't ever want to hurt Lance, hurting him, hurts me." Keith smiles softly and looks off into the distance, Pidge assumes he's thinking about Lance. "He's beautiful, funny, supportive, caring, loving and smart. But he's so much more and I can't even put into words how much I love him." Keith sighs.

Pidge stares at Keith wide eyed, Keith has never showed this much emotion and she's taken by surprise. Lance listens from the other side of the door and sighs, how does just a bug do that. It doesn't make sense, that much affection can't be brought on by just a stupid bug. Can it?


	14. Love doesn't work that way!

As a child Lance remembers his Mom always telling him that love would find him and he would be happy, or he'd be happy on his own. She always told him that if the relationship wasn't a healthy one then it wasn't actually love. He always used to want the type of love that his parents had, they were madly in love, sure they argued sometimes, but they made each other happy. Lance wanted that, but when he went to the Garrison he gave up on having a love life, he figured that nobody was really interested in that sort of thing and they needed to focus on their training, that didn't mean he stopped fooling around, he was a teen of course he would fool around.

When Lance first meet Keith, he honestly thought he was a little bit temperamental, and he wasn't really wrong there, but he didn't really know him properly. He didn't know much about him, but he was a bit of a show off, he wasn't a very good follower of rules either. But he was a damn good pilot and everyone knew it, he once got into a fight with James (some asshole kid at the Garrison that was always jealous of Keith) and ever since then, when other kids were terrified of him, Lance was amazed. He knew how to stand up for himself and wasn't afraid of others, Lance had always wanted to talk to him back then, but never had the courage to do it.

When they meet again when they all found the Blue lion, Lance thought it was some sort of fate. It was then that he realised that it was because he had a huge crush on Keith that he didn't have the courage to talk to him, so he covered his crush with the rivalry. When Keith started spouting about how much he loved Lance after the bite, Lance thought that maybe that could work, but then his Mother's voice found it's way into his mind and he realised that, that's not what love is, or how it works.

After hearing Keith confess that to Pidge, Lance goes back to his room and locks the door, he needs to think everything through and figure out what to do. They need to figure out a way to get whatever is in Keith out, it's not healthy for either of them, especially because Lance loves Keith and has for awhile now. To hear him confess all of that just to know he doesn't actually mean it hurts, and maybe if they can get the normal Keith back, everything can go back to normal, with Lance crushing on Keith and Keith hating him in return.

____

Keith watches as Pidge stares at him wide eyed, he raises an eyebrow at her in question. She clears her throat and looks at her laptop screen for a second before returning her gaze to him.

"That's the first time I've ever heard you confess how your feeling." Pidge says and she smiles, "that bug really is doing something." She frowns and looks down at the table in thought.

Keith furrows his eyebrows, "the bug?" He asks in confusion. "What bug?" Pidge looks back up at him and frowns deeper.

"Why do you think everyone keeps talking about you being bitten by a bug? Why Lance always says that you don't really love him, even after you've told him?" Keith frowns in concentration and sighs.

"I always thought it was some metaphor, as for Lance, I always thought that he just didn't believe me or something." Keith replies and Pidge gives him a weird look.

"Only you would think that." She sighs and then focuses back on Keith. "You and Lance went on a mission to get a flower for the castle ship, while you were on the planet you were bitten by a bug. Lance said that after the bite you just clung to him and you were acting strange. He brought you back to the castle and then you got all concerned when Lance hid behind Hunk." Pidge starts to explain.

"You told Hunk that if you found out he was hiding Lance you would hurt him, Lance came out before you got the chance. After that we figured out that you were bitten by a love bug. Which makes you fall in love with the first person you see, which in your case was Lance." Pidge sighs and then watches Keith for his reaction.

Keith just nods. "I remember what happened with Hunk, all I can describe it as would be, that I panicked when I couldn't see him or didn't know where he was. It was like I thought that if he wasn't in my sight then maybe he was being hurt, I can't even explain it." Keith explains, Pidge stares at him for a minute and then nods.

"Well, Lance was really worried. I mean you did whip your sword out and stick it in Hunk's face. I've never seen him jump into action so fast in the couple of years that I've known him." Pidge confesses, Keith winces and nods.

"I feel really bad for that by the way." Keith mutters and Pidge looks at him over her glasses.

"You better." She laughs.

______

Lance still doesn't know why Keith feels that way just because of that stupid bug. He starts to pace and is trying to understand what on earth is happening, there's a knock on his door and Lance stills.

"Who is it?" He asks and he can hear his heart pounding beneath his rib cage. Please don't let it be Keith, anyone but Keith.

"It's Shiro." Lance lets out a breathe of relief, he gets up, unlocks the door and jesters for Shiro to come into his room. He comes in and then Lance closes and locks the door behind him.

Lance turns to find Shiro looking at him with a raised eyebrow, Lance smiles sheepishly and Shiro sits on Lance's bed. He looks up at Lance and smiles softly.

"I was just wondering how you were doing." Shiro states, he looks at the floor, "we kind of all heard you and Keith before." Shiro says and Lance groans.

"You did?" He flops onto his bed and sighs deeply concerned.

"Well you guys weren't really quite, Pidge jumped so high when she heard you yell, then she muttered something about older brothers always scaring the younger ones." Shiro laughs and despite himself so does Lance.

"I do love Keith, but I know he's only acting the way he is because of that stupid bite. Which is irritating, because I don't want him to hate me after it wears off and I don't want to go backwards in our friendship." Lance begins and Shiro listens intently. "I don't want to take advantage of him or do anything that either of us will regret when he's him again, but seeing him 'love' me," Lance makes air quotes around love.

"It hurts, way too much. I can't stand it and I don't know what to do. I can't shut him out because if I do he becomes either depressed or violent. I also can't take advantage of him, because one he would never forgive me and two I wouldn't forgive myself." Lance has tears gathering in his eyes and he stops in his tracks.

Shiro pats his back in comfort and sighs. "Lance, I don't think you could take advantage of Keith, you can explain everything to him when he's back to normal, and things might be weird for awhile, but that will only be because Keith is embarrassed." Shiro smiles, but he so badly wants to tell Lance that Keith has loved Lance before the bug bite. However it's not his secret to tell and he knows that, so he doesn't say anything.

There's a knock on the door and then Keith's voice comes through. "Lance why is the door locked?" He asks and Lance goes ridged. Shiro smiles in sympathy, he remembers when he was that awkward in front of Adam.

Lance slowly gets up and unlocks the door, Keith is holding some food goo because Lance hasn't eaten, Keith spies Shiro over Lance's shoulder and frowns. "So I was right, Shiro likes you, but you also like him." Keith mumbles softly, his eyes tear up.

"What Keith no, we were just talking to each other." Lance tries to explain, Keith shakes his head as tears start to fall.

"Now you're lying to me too." He mutters, he's sobbing now and before Lance can respond Keith runs away and down the hallway.

"Keith!" Lance yells after him, Keith doesn't stop running.


	15. Keith's tears

Keith can't believe he was stupid enough to believe that Lance would ever love him back, being bitten by that bug didn't change anything. He would never be interested in him, and he had come to terms with that, he had. That stupid bug ruined everything. Keith lets the tears fall freely as he runs through the castle. He somehow finds himself in Blue's hanger.

She's waiting for him, she's powered on and when he walks in she turns her head. Blue purrs and Keith smiles at her, he walks up and places his hand on her metallic paw. She purrs again and continues to make comforting sounds until he sits next to her, she leans down and places her snout on the floor.

"Hey Blue." He greets quietly, she greets him back with a soft purr.

"I just don't understand why Lance likes Shiro and can't like me, I know Shiro's a lot better looking than I am, but I'm not that bad am I?" Keith just rants to Blue, she's there and she's listening. 

Blue growls her disapproval, but Keith isn't sure to what. She goes quite and Keith continues to tell her how he feels.

_____

Lance runs through the castle trying to find Keith and talk to him, he hears Blue purr and wonders what that's about. He stops and closes his eyes trying to connect with her and he sees through her eyes, like they've done some many times before. Keith's at her feet, talking about how Lance will never love him and that of course he loves Shiro, he's so much better. 

Lance shakes his head and lets Blue know he's coming into the hanger, he makes his way there and when Blue sees him she purrs, Keith frowns at her and turns to see Lance standing in the doorway, he scowls.

"Blue you're a traitor." Keith mutters to her and Blue shakes her head at him before powering off.

"Keith, I need to talk to you." Lance declares as Keith stands up. Keith looks at him briefly before ignoring him.

"Shiro and I were just talking, I was telling him that I knew you would never love me, without the bite. I mean I've never told you that I'm in love with you, but I am and maybe it wasn't right of me to assume that you wouldn't love me. But I was scared of rejection." Lance says quickly and in panic.

Keith looks at Lance and tears form in his eyes again. "You're telling the truth, aren't you?" Keith says and Lance laughs, but nods.

"Unfortunately and part of me is hoping that when the bite wears off you won't remember me saying any of this, but I can't stand to see you upset. I love you Keith, I've loved you since we were in the same class at the Garrison, I just knew you wouldn't like me back." Lance confesses with a shrug.

Keith laughs, "of course I like you back, I've liked you since then, but you always flirted with girls, so I figured you were straight." Keith sighs and then smiles.

"Keith, why did you come to Blue?" Lance asks and Keith blushes.

"Well she's your lion, so I figured she'd be the best to talk to you. She knows you better, and she listens and reassured me. I also kinda just found myself her, and she was powered on and waiting for me." Keith says and then furrows her brow. "I'm not too sure why though."

"Easy, she likes you." Lance declare and Keith looks up at him with wide eyes.

"Isn't she supposed to like you?" He asks with a smirk, Lance gasps.

"Why no sir, Blue loves me." Lance replies dramatically, Keith laughs. "She likes everyone else." Lance says and Keith narrows his eyes, but grins, Lance grins back at him.

"We should probably go back." Keith says and Lance nods, and smiles.

"I also kind of left Shiro, I was trying to catch up to you." Lance responds sheepishly.

Keith frowns when Lance turns around, but shakes it off, he has to stop being jealous all the time, Lance just literally confessed his love for him. Keith and Lance make their way out of the hanger and to the kitchen, Pidge is still there glued to her laptop and Keith gives her a small smile at that. 

She doesn't say anything to either of them and continues to type away on the laptop, Keith wonders what exactly it is she does with that laptop and how she can even use it, considering their in space. Keith actually think that might keep him up at night, seriously how does she use it? He would ask her, but half the things she would say, would go right over his head.

"Where is everyone else?" Lance asks, breaking me from my train of thoughts.

We both turn to watch Pidge, waiting for her to answer. She looks up at us and blinks as if she didn't even know we were there, which is quite possible.

"I think they're all in the lounge." Pidge muses as she turns her attention back to the laptop, Lance looks at her curiously.

"What are you doing?" He asks and Pidge looks back up, but she looks distracted.

"Well, because of the last time the castle-ship got hacked I wasn't able to stop it, I've decided to practice the whole hacking thing, so I can actually get it next time." She sighs and runs a hand through her short brown locks in stress.

"Pidge you're the best hacker I know, so you weren't able to get one hack before they hacked the ship, but you got it. And you always do, don't stress out about it, you need to have some fun. I don't think there's anything you can't do." Lance smiles and Pidge has tears forming in her eyes.

"You really think so?" She questions and Lance breaks into a wider smile.

"Of course I do, and I'm not the only one. We all trust that you got this Pidge and you do, you would never let us down, even when you think you do." Lance smiles softly at her and she breaks into a smile.

She moves forwards and wraps Lance up in a hug, Lance smiles softly with a soft expression on his face, he wraps his own arms around her and she smiles. Keith smiles at the exchange and thinks this must be one of the reasons he love Lance, he's always there for everyone and is kind. Lance picks her up and spins her around, Pidge laughs and Lance smiles, getting what he wanted.

"Let's go join the others." Lance tells her and Pidge nods with a smile.

"You're the best big brother ever!" She smiles and Lance ruffles her hair.

The three of them make their way to find the others and joke, smile and laugh along the way. Keith could get used to this.


	16. Kisses and Confessions

The three of them get to the lounge, and sure enough the rest of the Paladins, as well as, Allura and Coran are there. They are all chatting and having fun, Coran was in the middle of one of his very elaborate stories, something about a girl he tried to court throwing both her heels at his head and storming away. The Paladins and Allura burst out laughing at the face Coran makes and when he says he doesn't quite understand why she threw her shows, they laugh harder. Lance has a fond smile on his face at the sight. It reminds him of his abuela throwing her shoes around.

"Back on Earth, whenever my Grandma would get mad she would throw her shoes at you. It was scary because she always hit you, her accuracy was always spot on, my sister Veronica and I made an inside joke that, that's probably where we both get our amazingly good aim from." Lance laughs with a fond look, the Paladins and Alteans laugh with him.

"Oh my gosh, I remember when I was at you house once and your Grandma did that. You were so embarrassed and started yelling at her in Spanish, she ended up throwing that shoe at your head and yelling back at you in Spanish." Hunk laughs and Lance reddens at the memory.

"I didn't know you spoke Spanish Lance." Shiro declares and Lance looks at him and smiles. Keith for some reason feels proud that he knew that and Shiro didn't.

"Yeah, most of my family does. I don't speak it much, unless I'm really angry or upset, or if I'm around my family." Lance says and Shiro smiles.

Coran and Allura have confused looks on their faces. "What is this Spanish?" Allura asks brows furrowed. Lance gasps, and places a hand over his heart as if he's offended.

"What is- what is Spanish?" Lance gaps at them both. "Only the greatest language in the world and not to mention the dancing and singing. Oh it's the best." Lance sighs happily just by talking about it, and Keith gives him a fond look.

"It's a language?" Coran asks, "you speak it don't you my boy?" Coran stares at him in awe for a second.

"You should say something, so we know what this 'Spanish' sounds like." Allura gasps, eyes hopeful.

"Oh genial, ellos no saben qué es el español. ¿Que haré ahora? Gente inútil." Lance sighs, the words rolling off his tongue smoothly Allura and Coran look at him in amazement and Lance smiles at them.

"Keep going." Allura says excitedly.

"¿Por qué quieren que yo hable Español? Esto me hace extrañar la tierra. ¿Qué más hay que decir? Menos mal que nadie más habla Español." Lance stares at them and smiles. They are all staring at him in awe.

Lance blushes and averts his gaze from the rest of them, Allura and Coran seem to be trying to think of other questions to ask. Keith just stares at him with a fond look in his eyes, that's a little too hard to look at, Hunk just smirks and looks proud. Pidge and Shiro are smiling, looking at him in amazement too.

"How many languages are on Earth?" Coran questions and the Paladins think about it for a minute.

"6,500 languages I think." Pidge answers and both of the Alteans eyes widen in disbelief.

"That's a lot. Do all humans speak all of those languages?" Allura says, and Lance laughs softly.

"Of course not, Earth is a big planet and most humans haven't been everywhere there is to be. Although some humans learn other languages anyway, just for either something new, or if they need to know it for their jobs." Lance explains and Keith watching Lance smile and laugh feels jealous that that smile isn't directed at him.

"That sounds very exciting." Coran grins and Lance nods in agreement. Shiro's stomach grumbles and he reddens with embarrassment, they all laugh in amusement.

"I believe it is time to go make some dinner." Hunk says and gets up from his side of the couch. The others all nod in agreement, Lance still hasn't eaten all day, and he's starving.

The rest of them stay quite until Coran says he should probably go help Hunk with the food. Shortly after, Pidge says she has work to do, she drags Shiro with her. Allura says she also has some stuff do to, then it's just Keith and Lance. Lance isn't as stupid as everyone thinks, he sees what they're doing and he laughs.

Keith watches Lance carefully, and then walks over to him, he sits beside Lance and then doesn't know what to say to him. Anything he had thought of flew out the window the moment he was close enough to talk to Lance, Keith wants to smack himself, but refrains from making himself look like an idiot, well more of one anyways.

"I like when you speak Spanish," Keith confesses and he smiles very softly at Lance. "It sounds nice and rolls off your tongue very smoothly." Lance laughs.

"Cualquier cosa por ti, mi amor." Lance announces and Keith smiles and blushes. He really wants to kiss Lance.

"Can I kiss you?" Keith whispers and Lance falters, he doesn't say a word and he is stock still. "I mean, um never mind forget I said anything." Keith denies quickly.

"Keith, you know that I want to, it's just I don't want to take advantage of you well the bite is in affect. If you didn't actually feel this way, you would hate me when you are back to normal and that would break my heart." Lance counters and he sighs at Keith's disappointed look.

"I felt this before the bite though." Keith responds and Lance eyes him doubtfully.

"I can't know that for sure while your under the bites-" Keith surges forward and stops Lance from continuing, Lance stops talking immediately and stills, his body becoming tense.

Keith goes to pull away sensing his tension, but Lance tangles his fingers in Keith's hair and kisses him back like Keith is his oxygen and Keith muffles a surprised noise inside Lance's mouth. They are a mess of tongues and lips biting, hair pulling and wanting more. Lance knows he should pull away, tell Keith that they can't do this, especially right now, but he doesn't, he can't. He doesn't want to, they continue kissing, Lance bites Keith's bottom lip and sucks it into his mouth and Keith moans softly into it.

Keith shift his weight closer to Lance and then straddles his waist, and Lance grabs his hips, trying to pull him even closer, which seems impossible considering they're chest to chest. Keith moans again as Lance sucks on his lip and finally, finally they pull away for air, both panting for air, there's a cough from the door and they both look up to see Pidge standing there, they both redden and she coughs again.

"I need eye bleach to unsee that, not that I have anything against it but, you both are my family so, anyways it's time for dinner." She rambles, the tips of her ears red, she stalks out of the room quickly. Keith and Lance make eye contact and burst out laughing.


	17. More kisses?!

Keith and Lance follow after Pidge and Lance can't help the grin on his face. When they enter the dinning room, they take their respective seats and the others are eyeing them, Pidge is still blushing profusely. Lance assumes she told the others about what happened, Shiro raises an eyebrow at Lance and Lance just shrugs.

Hunk comes out of the kitchen with the food and places it on the table, he sits and everyone sits down and digs in. There's small talk around the table as they eat, not important issues, just stuff that they like talking about. Pidge about her technical stuff, Hunk with his food, Allura and Coran about Altea. Keith about not missing Earth and how lonely it was. Shiro talks about how the Garrison treated him when he got back to Earth, and Lance talks about how much he misses Earth and his family. 

After dinners over Keith drags Lance away from everyone else, he ends up dragging Lance into his room, he's looking at Lance with a sparkle of mischief in his violet eyes. He surges forward unexpectedly and kisses Lance again, Lance sighs into it and lets his body relax. Keith pushes Lance and he falls onto the bed, Keith looms over him, grinning down at Lance.

He leans down and kisses Lance again, Lance knows this shouldn't be happening, but if he pushes Keith away then Keith could get the wrong idea again. Lance is broken out of his thoughts when Keith bites at his bottom lip, and starts to insert his tongue. Lance gently separates their lips and turns his head to the side panting.

"Keith this isn't a good idea." Lance sighs and Keith rolls his eyes at him.

"Why because I don't actually love you?" He questions with a tilt of his head.

"That's exactly why and you know it." Lance replies angrily. Keith sighs in frustration and pushes off of Lance.

He's angry that Lance can't grasp that Keith loves him, he keeps insisting that Keith doesn't love him that it's the stupid bug. Keith knows that isn't true and it pisses him off that Lance keeps saying that.

"What more do I have to do to prove to you that I am in love with you?" Keith raises his voice

Lance sighs, "Keith, you might think you do, but you don't. It's the bug and believe me it breaks my heart that you're only doing all of this because of the bite." Lance feels tears sting behind his eyes, but blinks them away.

Keith huffs in frustration, but decides against saying anything, it won't do any good.

"I'll be right back. You can stay here if you want to, or go back to your own room. It's your choice." Lance says.

"No Lance, you don't have to leave. Please don't leave!" He grabs Lance's wrist in a panicked grip, and tries to pull him away from the door and into the room. Lance tugs his wrist out of Keith's grip and turns to him.

"Keith I just need to go talk to Pidge, I'll be right back okay?" Lance explains and then turns on his heel to leave the room. Keith lays on Lance's bed and just cries out his frustration.

____

Lance makes his way down the hallways of the castle at a fast pace, trying to hold back his tears. It's hard trying to hold back like that when Keith keeps saying how much he loves him, and won't let Lance forget it. Lance walks into the kitchen to see Pidge typing away on her laptop, he takes a deep breathe and enters the room so she can see him. Her eyes flick up over the screen of her laptop to see who it is, but she doesn't say anything, either thinking he isn't there to speak to her, or that if he is, he'll start talking.

Lance sits across from her and watches her carefully, she looks up at him again and then pauses what she's doing. She narrows her eyes at him and studies him carefully, he shifts then meets her eyes. She knows somethings wrong, she's perceptive like that.

"What's wrong?" She doesn't ask, she demands.

"When are these effects supposed to wear off?" Lance asks softly and Pidge raises an eyebrow at him in question.

"Well Coran said in one movement, if I've been counting correctly, it should be fine by tomorrow." Pidge says matter of factually, and then frowns at him. "Did something happen?" She asks carefully, Lance looks up to see her eyes have gone hard.

"Yeah, I just, I can't do this anymore." Lance sighs, and Pidge frowns even more if that's possible.

"Do what? Did he hurt you?" Pidge's eyes go cold and she looks like she's about to stand up and find Keith.

"No of course not. I thought Hunk would have told you, or you would've figured it out on your own." Lance declares with a furrow of eyebrows.

"Figure what out?" She questions narrowing her eyes.

"That I've had a crush on Keith seen the Garrison and that I've been hiding it with the whole rivalry thing." Lance says and Pidge's eyes widen in surprise.

"No, I never even thought that you had a crush on him. You mostly just bickered with each other, I thought that was just how you guys worked or what ever, I thought you really didn't like him, but because you were jealous of him." Pidge gaped at him and then smiled softly.

"Do you need us to distract him until it wears off?" Lance stares at her for a second.

"Yeah, I think that will be best. He'll hate me even more after this is over and I think he'll try really hard to ignore me or try to harm me." Lance shifts his gaze wanting to look anywhere but Pidge. Pidge nods in understanding.

"Alright, we'll make sure that he stays in his room for the night, he could even just go sleep over with Shiro, they're brothers after all." Pidge says thoughtfully, Lance nods his agreement and then he stands and stretches.

"Thanks for understanding Pidge." Lance smiles and reaches across the table to ruffle her hair affectionately. Pidge laughs and tries to duck her head when he goes to do it again. Lance bids her good night and heads to his room.

Now he just needs to talk to Keith about everything. Tell him to sleep in his own room and stay there, that the bite will wear off tomorrow at some point and he won't love Lance anymore. That he will probably even hate Lance. He wants to do this in a way that doesn't show how much it affects him, he really hopes that Keith doesn't remember anything after it wears off. He can hate himself for getting attached to Keith's presence later, right now he needs to go tell Keith what's happening and what needs to be done. It will hurt, but is necessary. He really prays Keith won't remember anything. Here goes nothing, he thinks as he stands outside his bedroom door.


	18. What do we do now?!

Lance walks into his room to find Keith curled up on his bed. He stops and stares at him for a second then walks closer towards the bed. He gently shakes Keith's shoulder to wake him, he groans softly and turns to face Lance stretching his arms in the process. Keith blinks awake slowly and when he opens his eyes, Lance is leaning over him, his glad that he's back.

Keith jumps up and wraps his arms around Lance tightly, Lance stumbles back in surprise and almost falls, but regains his balance. He tentatively wraps his arms around Keith in return and then gently pushes him away. Keith gives him a hurt expression, but Lance keeps his face void of emotion.

"Keith, I think it's best if you go back to your own room for tonight." Lance says coldly. Keith blinks and tears begin to form.

"But, I thought you just went to talk to Pidge, that you weren't mad at me." Keith declares, a tear slipping down his cheek, Lance frowns at him.

"I'm not mad at you." He states and Keith's brows furrow in confusion.

"Then why are you sending me away?" He sobs and Lance sighs.

"Tomorrow you will probably wake up and the effects of the bite will be gone. You won't love me anymore and we can go about our normal lives." Lance gives nothing away with his expression and Keith tears up again.

"What do I need to do to prove that I am in love with you?!" He screams and Lance tries not to let his expression soften.

"Tell me tomorrow when the bite wears off." Lance looks away and then goes to the door. "I think you should go now, I'm tired and want to go to sleep." He says tiredly and Keith lets a few more tears fall, before storming out the door. Lance sighs and collapses on the bed, he is out almost as soon as his head hits the pillow.

Meanwhile, Keith goes to his room and all but trashes it. He just doesn't understand how Lance can continue to tell him that he doesn't love him, he's shown him how much he loves him and yet he still doesn't see it. Keith makes his way to Coran's room and knocks softly, Coran opens it with a hop in his step.

"What can I do for you my boy?" He asks cheerfully, when he sees Keith's expression he frowns and ushers him into his room. "What is it?" He asks more seriously and Keith sighs.

"I keep telling Lance how much I love him, and every time I do he insists that I don't. I have proven that I do over and over again, but he still doesn't believe me." Keith's eyes water as he tells Coran. Coran's eyes soften and he sighs.

"If you are bitten by that bug, it doesn't just randomly make you fall in love with someone like I told Lance it did." Coran rubs his neck sheepishly, "the reason you fell in love with Lance was because you were already in love with him, the bug just amplifies those feelings. I figured you wouldn't want anyone to know yet, so I lied to them." Keith stares at Coran angrily.

"If you had told the truth, I wouldn't need to prove anything to Lance!" He states angrily and his tears spill over his cheeks.

"I didn't think you'd want him to know either way." Coran confesses and Keith scoffs, and shakes his head.

"You didn't ask me what I thought." He says simply and Coran chuckles.

"No, I guess I didn't. Would you like me to tell Lance the truth?" Coran asks, and studies him carefully.

"No, for some reason I feel like I need to tell him myself, after you can tell him what the bite really does." Keith shakes his head with a sigh. "I need some sleep, it will probably be hard to sleep without Lance." Keith bids Coran a good night and thanks him for his help.

He heads back to his room slowly, trying to draw it out. He was used to sleeping in Lance's room, beside him. When he reaches his room, he changes into sleep wear and lays on the bed with the lights off, he stares at the ceiling for what feels like forever. He tosses and turns for what must be another hour or two.

Finally, he gives up and gets out of bed. He head for Lance's room because he won't be able to sleep if Lance isn't beside him, maybe it's just this bite talking, but he doesn't want to leave Lance's side. Ever. Keith quietly enters Lance's room, and spots Lance's form on the bed. He's curled up, with a frown on his face, Keith smiles softly and crawls in beside him.

Lance stirs just slightly when the bed dips, but doesn't wake up. Keith sighs in relief, he lays down beside Lance and moves closer to him, even though his asleep, Lance moves closer to Keith. Lance curls around Keith and puts his head on Keith's chest, Keith is just glad he actually was going to cuddle with him, even in his sleep. 

"Go to sleep." Lance mutters tiredly and Keith jumps a little bit, Lance sighs and burrows closer to Keith. Falling asleep again, Keith smiles again and moves even closer, if that's even possible.

Keith is exhausted, all he did was toss and turn all night. He moves his head into Lance's brown curls and then is asleep. Lance tucked between his arms sleeping just as soundly.

____

Lance wakes up first, he opens his eyes feeling a light weight on his chest. He looks down to see black curls and pale skin, he smiles. That smiles slowly slips off his face when he realises that Keith should be back to normal today and he starts to panic. He goes to move, to get Keith off of him and leave the room, pretend he never was and that Keith just fell asleep in his room or something.

"Stop moving Lance." Keith sighs out, moving his head to rest in Lance's neck. He tightens his hold around Lance's waist and only relaxes it when Lance relaxes his body. This is going to end very badly, for Lance.


	19. Just great

Lance ends up falling back asleep, he doesn't even remember doing it. It's not like there was much he could do anyways, Keith was determined to keep him in the same spot. When there's a thud and Keith gasping, it startles him awake. He looks around the room and finds Keith on the floor.

He stills and stares at Keith intently, Keith stares back. He looks confused, like he has no clue why he's anywhere near Lance, let alone sleeping beside him. Lance moves carefully, throwing the blankets away from himself and getting up.

"Keith I can explain." He murmurers softly, Keith stares at him but doesn't move.

"Why am I in your room?" Keith questions and Lance sighs.

"Do you remember anything?" Lance asks fearfully. Keith shakes his head, he can't remember anything and Lance lets out a small breathe of relief.

"Well, when we went on the mission, you were bitten. Coran called it a love bug, and apparently it makes you fall in love with the person you first see, which in your case happened to be me." Lance rambles and Keith just stares at him.

"Did I do anything to, to anyone?" Lance inhales sharply at the question.

"You almost stuck your sword into Hunk, because you thought he was, and I quote 'hiding me.' You beat Shiro up, because you thought he was in love with me and was trying to 'split us up.'" Lance informs him and Keith inhales sharply and then looks at the ground in what Lance thinks is shame. "It wasn't your fault Keith, you weren't yourself. We all know that." Lance soothes.

"And to you?" Keith mutters and Lance furrows his eyebrows in confusion.

"What?" Lance questions, Keith looks up at him with a fearful expression.

"What did I do to you?" Keith wouldn't be able to forgive himself if he hurt Lance. He doesn't know if he will forgive himself for hurting Shiro and almost hurting Hunk.

"Are you asking if you hurt me?" Lance asks, frowning down at Keith. Keith nods in conformation.

"No you didn't, you didn't hurt Pidge, Allura, or Coran either." Lance answers and Keith lets out a breathe he hadn't realised he was holding.

"I should probably go talk to the others and apologise to them." Keith states, then he looks confused, "did I already apologise to them?" Lance breaths out a laugh.

"Yes, you did. Although I think that's only because I asked you to, you kept giving me excuses as to why you shouldn't be the one apologising." Lance laughs, Keith reddens.

"Now I feel even worse." Keith states and Lance smiles at him softly.

"You wouldn't hurt us on purpose and we know that." He says it so firmly and with such conviction that Keith's stomach flips, his heart racing.

"I'm going to go find the others." Keith says and stands up.

"Okay, did you want me to, maybe come with you?" Lance questions and Keith's brow furrows.

"No," Keith says a bit too quickly, he clears his throat, "I mean, no thanks though. This is something I need to do on my own." Keith rambles and Lance smiles.

"Well, get going then." Lance shoos him with a hand gesture and Keith is out the door in a matter of seconds.

"Just great." Lance sighs, this is why Lance wanted to be in his room by himself when Keith returned to normal, Lance is surprised that Keith doesn't remember anything.

_____

Keith leaves as soon as he can, his heart is racing and he just needs to get out of the room to process everything. Of course he remembered what happened during the bite, it didn't make him fall in love with Lance, it just made him act on the feelings he already had.

Lance doesn't know that and Keith wants to keep it that way for now, he remembers Lance telling Keith that he was in love with him, but Keith doesn't know for sure if that's how Lance really feels or, if he was just trying to keep Keith calm while he was under the bug bite.

He does remember Lance crying himself to sleep because Keith didn't really love him and Keith kept telling him he did. Keith doesn't really know what to do, he's not good at this kind of stuff, with emotions. Keith shakes his head and heads to the lounge. When he enters everyone but Lance is there, he stills and shifts. Hunk looks up at him and smiles nervously.

"Hey Keith, how are you doing buddy?" He asks and Keith feels bad that he makes Hunk this nervous.

"I wanted to apologise to all of you for how I've been acting for the last few days. Lance filled me in and I'm really sorry for almost hurting you Hunk." Keith says turning to Hunk, he turns to Shiro. "And I'm sorry for beating you up Shiro." Shiro smiles at him.

He turns to the other three, "and I'm sorry you three had to see it all and deal with me." Pidge laughs and Allura and Coran just smile.

"We all know you would never hurt us Keith, glad to have you back." Shiro declares and pats him on the back.

"Yeah, if you should be apologising to anyone it should be Lance." Pidge snickers and Keith whips to face her.

"What do you mean? Did I do something?" Keith questions in a rush and Pidge smirks at him.

"You could say that. Probably just gave him a few heart attacks is all." Hunk replies and Keith is still not following where they're going with this.

"I'm not following." Keith states and Pidge rolls her eyes.

"Well you kissed him a couple of times, and not to mention you always told him that you loved him and man did Lance look like a love sick puppy." Pidge informs Keith with a chuckle, Keith almost swallows his tongue at that. He did what now?!

"I'm sorry, come again?" Keith says with wide eyes. Pidge watches him carefully and sighs.

"You kissed him." She says bluntly, "and he liked it." She laughs at his expression.

Keith is actually going to kill Lance for not telling him about any of this. So Lance was telling the truth, he's in love with Keith and Keith is in love with him. Keith stalks out of the lounge to go track Lance down.


	20. Confessions and Tears

Keith goes to check Lance's room first, sure enough he's there and it doesn't seem like he's left since Keith did. He's standing in the middle of his room, listen to music, humming and dancing around his room. Keith smirks and watches Lance for a second, he's adorable. Keith taps his shoulder and Lance jumps and spins on his heel with a shriek. 

"Keith, what, what are you doing back?" Lance stammers, his ears turn just a tiny bit red and he's blushing.

"So you weren't going to tell me that we kissed?" Keith demands, Lance freezes and doesn't say anything. "Or that you liked kissing me?" Lance opens and closes his mouth a couple of times and then sighs.

"I thought you'd hate me, especially because you couldn't really consent to any of the kisses given." Lance explains, eyes downcast. He furrows his brow and looks up at Keith with a confused expression. "Wait, are you saying that you're mad I kissed you, or that you want me to kiss you?" Lance asks and Keith rolls his eyes.

"I want you to kiss me obviously, and I do remember everything, I lied. It was almost like I couldn't control my actions." Keith rambles nervously. "So, when you told me you loved me back, you weren't just saying that were you?" Keith looks up from the floor, and watches as Lance flushes and shifts his weight.

"I wasn't just saying it no, it's the truth. I hope that doesn't make anything weird between us." Lance clears his throat and Keith frowns.

"What are you talking about?" Keith inquires with a quirk of his eyebrow.

"I know that you don't feel the same way, so I don't want things to be weird between us, and I understand if you want to keep your distance from me now." Lance rambles and Keith laughs loudly, startling Lance, who stares at him in confusion.

"You idiot." Keith exclaims and Lance frowns at him. "I'm in love with you." Lance actually has to stop to process that thought.

"¿Tu que? ¿Como pudiste? Pensé que me odiabas." Lance rambles and Keith stares at him, confused.

"Lance, please use English. I have no idea what you're saying right now." Lance looks up at Keith and gives him a confused stare.

"Did I say that out loud?" Keith nods and Lance groans in embarrassment.

"I just, why would you love me? I'm not anything special, I'm the goofball. The one who normally screws everything up and lets not forget how many time I have. Not to mention, just look at you, I'm no where near as hot as you are." Lance rambles and Keith stares at him like he has grown two heads. 

"Dios, you know what I mean. I'm not great, there's so many people out there and I'm not the best one. I don't know." Lance sighs, running a hand through his hair.

"Lance, I love you for who you are. You're beautiful and kind., you fight for what's right and protect those you love even if you get hurt or almost killed in the process., which I hate. I love your jokes and silliness, I just love you." Keith has a fond smile on his face, and Lance can't hold back the tears that start to fall.

Keith looks up at him and his eyes widen at the tears falling down Lance's cheeks. He's never seen Lance cry before and he doesn't want to ever again, it's not a nice sight and Keith hates it. 

"Why are you crying?" Keith asks concern taking a step towards Lance.

"Because everyone always wants me to be one way and only my family love me for me. Everyone else always thought I was too goofy or immature. You're the first person to love me for who I am, quirks and all." Lance sobs and Keith's expression softens.

"I love you Lance." Keith says softly and Lance sobs louder.

"I love you too." Lance replies and Keith's smile widens if possible.

Keith walks towards Lance and wraps his arms around him, Lance leans down and places his head on Keith's shoulder and relaxes. He still can't believe Keith is in love with him, Keith that he's had a crush on since the Garrison. Lance relaxes, and hugs Keith tighter to him, Keith tightens his grip in return.

Lance backs up a bit, keeping Keith at an arms length. His eyes flicker down to Keith's lips and then Lance makes eye contact with him, he really wants to kiss him. Keith's eyes sweep over Lance's lips and then he smiles, he leans forwards and Lance leans in to meet him.

Their lips meet softly and Lance sighs into the kiss, he can't believe he's in love with Keith and Keith's in love with him. Lance smiles and it's enough for Keith to lick the seam of his lips, Lance's attention is back on Keith's lips attached to his own. He's so happy that this is what happened, all because of a stupid love bug.

______

The next day, Lance and Keith emerge from Lance's room with bed head. They head to the kitchen together to have breakfast with everyone and Keith doesn't know if Lance is planning on telling the others about their relationship or not. He doesn't know if he should be keeping it under wraps, or telling the whole world that they're together.

They walk into the kitchen, everyone else is already there and Pidge's attention is immediately on Keith's neck. She smirks and nudges Hunk pointing out Keith's neck, Hunk looks up and scowls, he hands over 20 bucks while Pidge grins.

"Hey Keith, is that a hickey?" Pidge asks and Keith reddens hands flying to the side of his neck covering the spot while glaring daggers at Lance.

"Indeed it is Gremlin and Keith wears it with pride. Don't you babe?" Lance snarks, his question directed at Keith, Keith's cheeks redden.

"I guess." He mutters, Lance well always be an embarrassment. Somethings won't change, and he hopes that they'll have a long future together. Lance shoots him a grin, and hands him a bowl of food goo and kisses his cheek.

Pidge woos and Hunk smirks, the others all smiles at them knowingly and Keith can't help but smile. He is so madly in love with the boy in front of him, he takes his seat next to Lance and talks with his team, no his family, about everything and anything.


End file.
